Sleeping Beauty
by SlytherinSchoolgirl
Summary: Consumed by sudden illness, a princess is rendered unconscious and barely clinging to life. But while hope and patience run dry, her bride is still fiercely determined to save her. If only it were as easy as true love's first kiss. — Azula/Ty Lee; alphabet drabbles, complete.
1. Acceptance

_**AN:**_ _This is a Tyzula!Alphabet Story that is more of a chronological drabble series tied together with a solitary theme than a fic with an intense plot. It will have twenty-six chapters and use the following words:  
_ _ **a**_ _cceptance,_ _ **b**_ _ondage,_ _ **c**_ _ompassion,_ _ **d**_ _ivision,_ _ **e**_ _cho,_ _ **f**_ _ear,_ _ **g**_ _iving,_ _ **h**_ _ope,_ _ **i**_ _ntensity,_ _ **j**_ _etties,_ _ **k**_ _iller,_ _ **l**_ _oss,_ _ **m**_ _other,_ _ **n**_ _urturing,_ _ **o**_ _pposition,_ _ **p**_ _ractice,_ _ **q**_ _uestion,_ _ **r**_ _elationship,_ _ **s**_ _elfishness,_ _ **t**_ _rust,_ _ **u**_ _nderstanding,_ _ **v**_ _enom,_ _ **w**_ _orried,_ _ **x**_ _anadu,_ _ **y**_ _es,_ _ **z**_ _enith.  
_

* * *

 **Sleeping Beauty**

* * *

Scared to die  
I won't pretend  
More than anything  
I'm afraid to meet your end  
I can see your light fading _  
_"Dark Star" by Hypnogaja

* * *

 **Night One: A** cceptance

* * *

"You can leave, you know," Fire Lord Zuko says, as if it is even in the _realm_ of possibility for Princess Ty Lee.

She is just staring at her feet, the tea in her hand having long ago gone cold. He looks at her with such _pity_ in his eyes, and she tries to remind herself that he is hurting too. That he loves her too, but not how _Ty Lee_ loves her, and, therefore, he cannot understand why Ty Lee will not leave even for a second.

"I feel horrible. I can't leave in case she wakes up," Ty Lee whispers and Zuko frowns faintly.

"Well, if you need to get some water or pee or anything, just tell me or Mai." The Fire Lord feels uncomfortable, but Ty Lee is remorseless. She would feel, if she _could feel_ at this point. "Katara will be here in three nights. Azula will be fine for that long; every healer says so."

"For that long," Ty Lee whispers as she picks at her bare knees.

 _Bare legs. Ty Lee loves how smooth her own legs feel, but they do not feel as good as Azula's hands on them. The princess pins her fiercely against the wall, their lips locked and Azula's tongue in her mouth, pressing against her cheek._

 _Ty Lee digs her arms into her and they are both so_ alive _, so vibrant. Ty Lee can feel their hearts racing and pounding. She is damp and hot and wraps herself more tightly around Azula as the princess pushes her hands further up her smooth, bare legs._

"You okay?" Zuko asks, interrupting Ty Lee's beautiful image of her vibrant life before this mess.

"Yeah..." Ty Lee murmurs.

A few days ago, Azula just slipped away. Away from this world, away from everything. The sickness was sudden and baffling; it just came out of nowhere and hit Ty Lee like lightning. Now Azula has been surrounded by healers for days, and they say she should live for a while, but they have no idea when or if she will wake up.

Princess Ty Lee is trying her absolute best to be an optimist about this. But accepting her loss of Azula is almost impossible to her. Still, she just stares and hopes that something in Azula knows that she has refused to leave her side, even for a second.

Night falls, Ty Lee paces. Night falls, Ty Lee becomes so tired.

She looks at Azula, Azula lying in front of her. The healers are gone, but nearby, in case there is some kind of malevolent new development. Ty Lee walks to her slowly and sits down on the bed. Azula does not move, and Ty Lee does not know why she is doing this to herself.

Ty Lee lies down, slipping beneath the blankets. She feared they would be clammy, or sweaty or somehow noxious, but they feel how they do any night. And Ty Lee rests her head on Azula's shoulder.

She _will_ sleep by her tonight.

Because she knows that it could be the last.

 **睡美人的镜子**

"You can leave, you know," Fire Lord Zuko says to his sister, as if he expects Princess Azula to even listen to him for a moment.

Her golden eyes are fixated on her feet, the vacant stare of a woman who has been spending years of her life trying to fix an unfixable broken thing called herself. Azula hates his pity; it makes her want to burn him or scream at him or just throw herself from the window behind her. But she remains icy and stoic. She will not leave Ty Lee's bedside, even for a second.

"I will not leave or move until she wakes up, brother. Do you understand?" Azula says coldly and Zuko frowns, not bothering to conceal his discontent.

"Well, if you need anyth─"

"I need nothing, Zuko. Leave." Azula clenches her jaw. It is not as if he cares about Ty Lee. It is not as if he even thinks Azula is capable of the love she feels. Nor is it as if Azula has ever shared the love she feels.

Azula just looks at her bruised, bare legs.

 _Bare legs. Azula loves how smooth Ty Lee's long, slender legs feel, and they make her burn with a raging inferno of desire. Princess Azula pins her paramour hard against the cool stone wall wall, their lips locked and Azula's tongue in her mouth, pressing against her cheek._

 _Ty Lee digs her arms into her and Azula has never felt more alive._

"You okay?" Zuko asks, interrupting Azula's blissful reverie.

"I would appreciate it if you would leave me in peace," Azula says coldly and Zuko knows that it would be a waste of time to try to reason with her.

Three days and eleven hours ago, Ty Lee slipped from the world of the living. Azula was livid; Azula blamed everyone and anything within the vicinity. Her rage was white hot and potent. Ty Lee's sickness came from absolutely _nowhere_ and Azula was utterly certain that it was poison.

But the healers found no trace of it in her system, and once Azula had calmed down, she accepted that it was likely the truth. Now Ty Lee has been swarmed with healers and people who anger Azula for three days and eleven hours, and they keep saying Ty Lee will live, but they are so _clueless_ about when she will wake up, no matter how many times Azula demands a more specific answer.

Princess Azula knows that Ty Lee would want her to keep her chin up. _"Life is too short to be anything but happy,"_ she would say. But Azula thinks that it is impossible to keep that in mind when she is in this situation. She can only stare, sometimes needing to leave because of her panic attacks, and she hopes that Ty Lee will know that Azula refused to leave her side.

That Azula would not accept losing Ty Lee. Because Ty Lee did not accept Azula's sulking, Azula's descent into illness when Ty Lee worked tirelessly to repair her.

Night falls, Azula paces and sweats. Night falls, Azula is tired, even though she knows she will just have vivid and horrific nightmares.

Azula looks at what might as well be a corpse lying in front of her, resting on the dark red mattress. Two days and fourteen hours ago, Azula had hallucinations that it was soaked with Ty Lee's blood and Mai had to drag her away to Mai and Zuko's room and calm her down, even though Azula did not want to leave Ty Lee.

The healers have left, as if _their families_ are somehow more important than _Azula's family_. Selfish jerks. Azula walks to Ty Lee slowly and sits down beside her, hoping no one will think she is trying to bed a comatose girl. Ty Lee does not move and Azula tries not to think too much.

Azula lies down and tries to sleep beside Ty Lee.

 **睡美人的镜子**

They sleep beside each other. One is comatose, the other exhausted from tears she could not hide, that spilled freely from her eyes. And, at last, they both drift away, wishing they could somehow be connected in their dreams.

Ty Lee wakes in a strange place. It feels weird to her, and she has no idea what she is surrounded by. She gasps for breath, and realizes how aromatic and fruity the air is. It smells like the perfume of a young, rich girl. This world is utterly beautiful, and it is definitely in Ty Lee's dreams.

Princess Ty Lee has never been a lucid dreamer in her life. Therefore, she immediately suspects that this is something strange and supernatural. She scurries away from the pretty patch of jungle where she has woken up, and starts walking through the humid and beautiful trees.

She is surrounded by plants, flowers and fruits that are all in vibrant jewel tones. Ty Lee would stop to examine or even taste them if she were not so focused on finding the source of this odd dream as quickly as possible.

Ty Lee suddenly is gone from her damp and crystalline jungle, and the air around her is arid and hot. Desert. She has gone straight from a jungle to a desert.

"Ty Lee?" asks a voice that is familiar. A voice that Ty Lee has feared she would never hear again.

"Azula?" Ty Lee responds sharply, spinning around in circles looking for the princess.

Princess Azula runs to Ty Lee as quickly as she can, thinking about how she thought she might never see her again on anything but a deathbed or a fire. Their lips collide fiercely and they wrap their arms tightly around each other.

Azula wonders what she could have done to earn this beautiful paradise, or how the Universe would ever reward her by letting her _share_ this paradise. But she tries not to think about that for too long as she drags Ty Lee further into her arms.

"Azula, I missed you," Ty Lee says softly, wanting to say her wife's name a thousand upon a thousand times. "Azula, Azula..."

Azula kind of wants Ty Lee to _scream_ her name a thousand upon a thousand times. Her body wants and craves and _needs_ them both to be perfectly nude. It _is_ her dream, of course, and it should be allowed to be a hot dream if she wants it to be, but they gently break apart.

"We should look around this place," Azula says softly and Ty Lee nods in agreement.

"Is this real?" Ty Lee asks as Azula moves ahead of her and starts scouting around the desert.

"It's pretty obviously a dream," Azula says, shrugging and climbing to examine the desert around her.

"Is it mine?" Ty Lee asks and Azula turns around, raising an eyebrow.

"Of course it isn't, stupid. It's mine," Azula says and Ty Lee's lips part in surprise.

"I heard once that if you love someone enough, you can share these things with them," Ty Lee says and Azula snorts derisively.

"Right... of course." Azula rolls her eyes. Ty Lee's ravings about _auras_ and _spirits_ have always struck Azula as completely absurd.

"No, no. Tell me something I don't know about you, but your brother or Mai would know," Ty Lee insists fiercely as Azula climbs up onto a rock and starts surveying their surroundings.

Azula contemplates the notion for a moment and ultimately decides that it can't hurt.

"My brother and I once broke this vase filled with really expensive mint oil from the Earth Kingdom. My grandfather _treasured_ it because it was all he had left of his military career. I'm starting to wonder if he was insane," Azula says and Ty Lee has _definitely_ never heard this story. "My brother and I hid the stained carpet in an unused cabinet in the guest wing of the living quarters, and we buried the pieces near the turtleduck pond."

Ty Lee then says, "When I was in the Boiling Rock with Mai, she told me that she wanted you to kill her that day, and that I shouldn't have gotten involved, so that I could have you. I never told anyone because I didn't want her to sound weak. You two really hate sounding weak."

Azula is somewhat stunned by that. "I had no idea..."

"I try not to talk about the time you locked me in prison to rot," Ty Lee says as Azula slides down from the rock and decides that they are alone in this wasteland.

"That's for the best," Azula purrs before gazing at Ty Lee. "How did you respond? You must have been livid."

"I accepted what I did. In the end, I knew it would either work out or it wouldn't and I couldn't waste my life being angry," Ty Lee admits, shrugging.

Azula looks at her, her lips pursed. She does not want to think about _acceptance_. "Well, we're trapped in this desert with nothing interesting to do, and it doesn't seem like anything here wants to kill us yet..."

Ty Lee cannot hide the amused smirk. "So, you're thinking what I'm thinking then...?"

Azula has already starting stripping off her shirt.

 **睡美人的镜子**

Azula slowly wakes up and wants to cling to her dream, although she knows that it is gone. Acceptance? Why would she ever accept this. _Why would she ever accept this_? There must be something she can do, and none of these people will _ever_ steal it from her.

She sits up, looking at the beautiful woman lying beside her. Princess Azula almost hoped that Ty Lee would stir and wake right now, but she will not. And for now, Azula has to accept that.

Until she rescues Ty Lee, no matter what the cost.

Princess Azula has lost enough in her life to make her willing to lay waste to a thousand empires in order to get this one woman back from what might as well be death.

Azula will only _accept_ this dismal situation if she dies too.

In the morning, she tracks down Mai. The Fire Lady looks exhausted, and she has Izumi on her lap.

"What do you want?" Mai asks sharply, and Azula would chastise her rudeness if she were not so preoccupied with Ty Lee.

"When you were in the Boiling Rock, did you tell Ty Lee you wanted me to kill you and that she shouldn't have interfered?"

Mai's jaw drops. She can only stare at Azula, agape.

"Yes. But how did you... why?"

Azula is gone without inquiring further.

 **睡美人的镜子**

Ty Lee wakes, startled, breathing heavily. It could not be true. She had heard about those silly stories of shared dreams and the true intimacy of it. But even Ty Lee, who would not knock a single thing she heard right away, could not believe that kind of thing.

Yet, here she is, having just been on what feels like an impossible journey.

Azula is still beside her, still a breathing corpse. Ty Lee gazes at her for some time, at the rise and fall of her chest, or how cold and sad her lips look. The dream was beautiful, but reality still exists, and still insists on dragging Ty Lee back into it.

Ty Lee knows that she has to accept this reality if she is going to change it. But the acceptance is as hard to swallow as the gross fish oil her mom used to give her when she had colds. Still, Ty Lee will not give up.

She breathes in and out.

Acceptance. Azula is gone for now, but Azula is _never_ gone forever.

She tries to go back to sleep, resting her head on Azula yet again.

It is futile.

"Sorry. I didn't notice you were..." Zuko remarks as he sees Ty Lee sleeping beside Azula. "... here."

"I'm awake. It's okay," Ty Lee says, feeling exhausted.

Then, Ty Lee blushes as she feels the heat in her thighs, and so she keeps herself covered by the silky blankets from the waist down.

"Zuko," Ty Lee demands. "Will you take me to where you hid your grandfather's mint oil?"

The Fire Lord's eyes flash in shock, but he obliges.


	2. Bondage

**Night Two: B** ondage

* * *

Ty Lee stares at the hiding place of Azula and Zuko's childhood mistake, and gazes at the Fire Lord. He examines her, unsure what is wrong. Her lower lip trembles as she looks at the mundane shards of glass, the strong smell of Earth Kingdom mint invading her nostrils, forcing its way into her soul.

Her soul. Maybe the dream was not just a dream. Maybe Azula is lost in there, perhaps her soul is trapped, trapped between worlds and Ty Lee has no clue how to rescue her. Not that anyone would believe Ty Lee; they would all think she had gone insane.

"Are you alright? How did you know about this?" Zuko pauses, seeming to be thinking. "Do you think this can help Azula somehow?"

 _I think this might mean that the Azula I dreamt about is the_ real _Azula_ , Ty Lee wants to exclaim blithely, but she knows they will dismiss her as crazy, or blinded by her love and devotion to her wife.

"I just wanted to see it. She told me about it, is all," Ty Lee says weakly, mentally berating herself for not having a better excuse on hand.

Zuko gazes at her with pity glistening in his golden eyes, and Ty Lee looks away. She does not want them to see her like that. Everyone looks at her like she has already become a widow, and it makes Ty Lee sick to her stomach.

She wrings her hands and abandons the evidence that dreamworld Azula is the real Azula, and goes to the kitchen to find water. It is just now that she realizes how painfully, agonizingly thirsty she is. The servants look at her, with that same, pitying the widow gaze, and Ty Lee seizes a glass without asking, without doing the normal things a princess should, and she fills it herself in a bucket of half melted ice water.

It feels cool against her lips, but there is no relief. She sits down in the dining room outside of the kitchens and continues to nurse her cup of water, even though her body wants to spit it all out.

How many days does it take to die of dehydration? Three. Ty Lee thinks it is three. And she also knows what a painful way that is to go, but there is a part of her that just _wants_ to take the easy way out.

 _"I'm not drinking it," Azula protests fiercely, although her voice is hoarse and weak. "It takes three days to die of dehydration, and obviously I'm not dying of hunger very easily at this point. I don't have enough patience for that."_

 _Ty Lee stares vacantly at her, tapping her fingers on her legs, wondering what she is supposed to say. She was just signed on as Azula's bodyguard a few days ago, and Azula did not speak to her, or even honestly move. Ty Lee was told that Zuko had been trying everything, but Azula rejected the invasions into her mind._

 _But Ty Lee was more patient, surprisingly. Ty Lee was not going to take no for an answer, or just sigh like Zuko did. Because Ty Lee still remembers her dreams of a life with Azula. Big dreams that she doubts will come to pass, but give her the drive to force this girl to eat and drink if it is the last thing she does._

Water. Then the water reminds her of the slim ray of hope. Tomorrow morning, Katara should be here. She can look at Azula and try to heal her. Water. Ty Lee drinks the rest of her glass without her angry, lonely mind protesting and begging her for suicide.

Katara will heal Azula and save her soul from wherever it is trapped and lost. She _will_. Ty Lee _knows_ that she will.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula stares at Mai blankly, and Mai picks at her lips, not wanting to make eye contact. While Azula has come to terms with the fact that people evade her eyes, she _does_ know that it has been exacerbated of late. She once was looked at as the Mad Princess; now she is looked at as something sad to pity. A widow-to-be.

"Why do you ask?" Mai at last feels forced to inquire.

"Promise you won't think I'm crazy," Azula whispers and Mai would make a joke if she had the energy in her. Right now, Ty Lee is preoccupying her nearly as much as Azula. "I slept next to her last night, and I dreamt about her, obviously. But the dream felt very real. I thought she was a construct of my mind meant to cope with the situation, but then she told me that. Told me something I wouldn't know."

Mai purses her lips. She does not know how to respond to Azula's honesty and vulnerability she has shown.

"They say that sometimes lost souls meet up places," Mai says cryptically and Azula's eyebrow twitches with a surge of blue hot anger. "It's true. But you won't know until tonight, I guess."

Ty Lee's _soul_? That feels absurd to Azula. But given what she has seen, in the Spirit World, in her descent, perhaps a dream is not always just a dream. Maybe Ty Lee is lost and trapped, and that thought suddenly makes Azula feel as if she is suffocating.

"I have to go," Azula manages to stammer out before walking away.

Mai stares after her, wondering if she is insane or not. Perhaps she just wants to believe, and Mai cannot blame her for that.

Azula bumps into Zuko on her way back to Ty Lee's room. Her brother has such infinite pity in his golden eyes, the way he looked at her when she was so sick. He wanted to _care_ for her, and he asked everyone to pity her and not punish her. And, to this day, Azula hates him for it.

Being tied and trapped like that, beneath her brother's thumb, was utter torment.

 _Ty Lee is on Azula's lap. Azula is reveling in the sensations of her body, and Azula herself is on fire. She allows herself to be pushed down by Ty Lee, as she has started to not mind occasionally relinquishing control in their sex._

 _But when Ty Lee binds Azula's wrist to the bed, there is only sheer and utter panic. Azula screams, and fights, and Ty Lee regrets._

Azula walks to Ty Lee's room, and sees the healers still tending her.

"Katara is coming tomorrow," says the eldest one from behind her sweaty grey bangs.

"Right, of course. So she can be the damned hero again," Azula snaps before secluding herself to the chair in the corner yet again.

Maybe none of these people have hope. But Azula _will_ save Ty Lee, because there is no reason that Azula should solely play the villain.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

They fall asleep together, interlinked at the limbs and hips. One woman has numb limbs and no response, the other tries to warm her wife, even if she cannot feel it.

Ty Lee wakes somewhere slightly different than the first place she encountered. But she immediately stands up, brushes the dirt from her skin, takes a moment to get her bearings, and then starts running to find Azula. She _needs_ to see her.

She needs desperately to see her alive.

Azula wakes up somewhere intoxicatingly beautiful. There is lush foliage and a sky filled with crystal clear starts, indigo shadows falling over her body. She sits up and looks around, gazing at the raw beauty, and then feeling a chill of discomfort. This world should not exist.

She stands up and looks around, deciding to make her way in the most obvious direction. All she wants is to find Ty Lee. Azula can still remember the genuine heat in her body from their tryst in this purgatory. It felt incredible, _real_.

And Azula sees her, her golden eyes lighting up excitedly as she runs towards the edge of the beautiful paradise. Then Azula skitters to a stop; Ty Lee is not fast enough, and her face collides with the sudden barrier between them.

This is not how it is supposed to work. It is their _dream_ world, of fantasy and freedom. Azula pounds against the clear walls of the cage she is in. The beauty was a lie.

"Can you hear me?" Azula asks and Ty Lee nods.

"Can you?" Ty Lee breathes in response, and Azula nods too, her chest heaving with the deep breath she steals.

"I asked Mai. You're you. Not a you I made up," Azula states and Ty Lee's eyes flicker in surprise.

"Zuko showed me the mint oil," Ty Lee says and they both stare at each other, their skin prickling. This world is... strange and eerie. And the barrier makes them think that perhaps it is not as benevolent as it seems.

"Ty Lee, are you lost here?" Azula whispers as she presses herself further against the barrier.

"I want to ask you the same thing," Ty Lee says softly, looking at the pretty pink jungle around her.

She then narrows her eyes at the indigo, starlight, and fire red flowers on Azula's side. Ty Lee's eyes shift to hers. Then she looks back and forth again. Azula wears a quizzical expression when Ty Lee looks back to her.

"We're both trapped," Ty Lee whispers in fright. "It's not just you."

"It's not just me?" Azula asks, confused.

"Look at the cages," Ty Lee says, gesturing around. "We're bound to places like our auras."

"I don't believe in auras," Azula snaps, although she really doesn't want to believe that they are both encaged here.

"Look at what you're seeing. You're in a living dream. Can you really say you don't believe in it now?" Ty Lee asks breathlessly and Azula furrows her brow before nodding.

"Maybe you're right. How do we get out?" Azula demands.

"I think... I think we have to figure that out," Ty Lee says, her eyes widening. Azula realizes it too, but it feels almost like the idea is implanted in her brain.

This place is strange, strange and enigmatic.

"Then I can save you," Azula says, deciding she _will_ play along with this strange place.

If freeing Ty Lee from her cage also frees her from her coma, everything will work out much, much better.

"Stay with me until we figure this out better," Ty Lee says, touching her hand to the glass. Azula hesitantly meets her, having no fear of being seen as weak when she is alone in this dream world.

"Of course." They slide down, sitting near each other, both anguished by their inability to touch each other.

It pains them both.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula wakes groggily after falling asleep with her head leaning against the barrier keeping Ty Lee in her cage. She slowly sits up and examines the nearly lifeless body beside her. Ty Lee is bound, bound to her broken body here. And in her mind, she must be stuck too.

But Azula will not stand for that. Freedom is something the princess has come to value about all other things in her life. Hers was stolen enough times for her to understand the importance of it.

She gently kisses Ty Lee's feverish lips, and pulls away, deciding to study and devour any information she can find on this type of dream, and if it has ever happened before.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee languidly wakes up, yawning and stretching. Her corporeal body feels just as cramped as her spirit, after falling asleep curled up. But in this world, her face rests on Azula's skin, and that makes her feel so alive.

Until she realizes that, soon, Azula could be dead.

Ty Lee can think of only one person who could know about these dreams and what they mean. One person who could perhaps help her with how to free Azula from her cage.

The same woman who taught Ty Lee how to block the flow of chi.


	3. Compassion

**Night Three, Part I: C** ompassion

* * *

Azula gets out of bed, the taste of Ty Lee's lips still on hers. It feels slightly disturbing to have kissed an unconscious woman, but Azula did, and she has to say she enjoyed it. Her fingers brush against her own lips before she rises from her bed and walks to go get dressed behind a beautiful, ornate divider. The light falls through it and illuminates her ivory skin as she dresses herself for a day of studying.

She finishes making herself look presentable, making herself look less like a woman preoccupied with whether she will be a widow or not, and then she walks towards the libraries buried deep on the other side of the palace.

But Azula finds someone blocking her way when she tries to leave the living quarters. It is her brother, and she has half a mind to burn off the other side of his face.

"You haven't spoken to your daughter in how many days?" Zuko demands and Azula just looks at him, and at last, shrugs.

"Are you insisting that I check on her?" Azula inquires, raising an eyebrow and trying to pretend that she is utterly guiltless and Zuko is wrong.

She does know it is a mistake to have been avoiding dealing with such an important responsibility. But it was one that mainly fell upon Ty Lee, and Azula cannot face the idea of doing it on her own. That would be like giving up.

"I am certain that she is fine on her own," Azula insists coldly, crossing her arms. "At least until your water slut gets here and heals Ty Lee and everything is back to normal."

Zuko gives her a look that makes her lip curl into a snarl. _Pity_. He pities her because she believes that her wife will live. There is nothing wrong with that, _at all_. Azula should be commended for doing everything in her power to save Ty Lee instead of just sitting around and waiting for the waterbenders to do it.

"I'll tuck her in tonight. She's happy playing with Izumi anyway," Azula says coldly, deciding it is the best course of action. But even trying to convince herself of all of the logic in the world does not help with the fact that she fears becoming her mother.

She does not want her daughter to think that she hates her. She does not want to abandon her child and be like Ursa… but Ty Lee needs Azula more right now.

And so, Azula steps around Zuko before he can say another word, and walks to go study the books in the royal library.

She buries herself deep within them and focuses intently on finding absolutely anything she can about mysterious dreams and what could cause them. Most of what she finds is in fairy tales and legends, _myths_ , things that no on in the Fire Nation has believed for over a century.

It is impossible to share dreams, but Azula _knows_ that the dreams she shares with Ty Lee are real.

Or is she just a desperate woman looking for anything to cling onto?

Azula is interrupted when she finds out she has been in this cold, dusty library for longer than she thought she was. Katara has arrived, early seemingly, and Azula avoids greeting her. She says nothing, knowing that the few words of compassion that Katara offered are lies.

Katara does not care if Ty Lee lives or dies, because she hates Azula. And Katara will be of no use to Azula because everyone will think she is crazy. No one listens to you when they think you're crazy.

"I'm going to just examine her. And then see where to go from there," Katara says hesitantly, not hiding the shock and then sadness when she sees Ty Lee's state.

 _That_ is genuine compassion. Not that Katara would show it to _Azula_ in a thousand years.

The princess needs her either to heal Ty Lee or die.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee gets out of bed when she feels a small hand tugging on her ankle. Stretching, Ty Lee looks up and then down at her daughter. The little girl has her face contorted with concern and Ty Lee's heart pounds with regret about that fact.

"What's happening?" the girl asks. "Will momma be okay?"

"Of course," Ty Lee says, removing her face from Azula's skin and immediately regretting it. She wishes she could linger here with Azula forever, but her daughter needs her mother than that. "I'm going to go talk to a woman who might know how to heal momma. Would you like to come with me?"

Ty Lee looks down at her daughter, offering a hopeful glance.

Mizuki still looks displeased, and, if Ty Lee knows her as well she knows that she does, her toddler is quite scared. And why would she not be? Azula's illness is said to have been brought on by being lost in the Spirit World, but Azula has said nothing about that, and now she is in no state to tell anyone what could have happened.

"Yes," Mizuki finally chimes and Ty Lee nods, gently rubbing her shoulder and getting out of bed. She tries not to draw attention to the fact that she had been sleeping in bed with a comatose woman, which is disturbing on numerous levels.

Ty Lee gets dressed as Mizuki follows at knee level, silently watching, underfoot until Ty Lee grabs her and forces her messy black hair into a topknot.

Holding her up to the bathroom mirror, she can see how different Mizuki looks compared to Ty Lee. They, of course, have no common features. Mizuki is Azula's, Mizuki is royal, and Ty Lee is _not_. But Mizuki has always been closer to Ty Lee, much to Azula's frequent anguish.

It is not Azula's fault that neither of her parents ever showed her true compassion. That is the sort of thing that you need to have in order to grow into an adult who can care for their child and family.

Ty Lee finishes making herself and her transfixed daughter look presentable, making herself look less like a woman preoccupied with whether she will be a widow or not, and Mizuki less like a neglected ruffian, and then she walks towards the wide front doors of the palace.

But Ty Lee finds someone blocking her way when she tries to leave the living quarters. It is her brother in law, and Ty Lee does not like the worried expression on his face at all.

"Where are you going?" Zuko asks, sounding as if he is trying not to sound commanding, but he does anyway. "Katara is getting here this afternoon; don't you want to be there for Azula?"

"I'm taking Mizuki to get new shoes. She needs them and we will be back before Katara gets here. You know that, don't you, Zuko?" Ty Lee says warmly and he chews on his lip. But he steps aside, as he would have anyway.

Thankfully they are out of earshot when Mizuki asks, "Why did you lie to Uncle Zuko?"

"I don't want to tell him about why I'm going to see my friend. You shouldn't lie, but sometimes adults have to lie to each other. Sometimes that's just how it works."

Ty Lee takes Mizuki to the home of her teacher and it smells so strongly of incense that it makes the little girl have a fit of sneezes. Ty Lee holds her in her arms and waits for it to pass, murmuring words of comfort.

When Rei emerges, Ty Lee is ready for anything. She is embraced, Mizuki unwillingly part of the union, and her nose is assaulted by strong perfume that contrasts to the already pungent incense.

"It's lovely to see you, Ty Lee," Rei says happily, gesturing to a share with several scarves wrapped over it. Mizuki clings to Ty Lee, looking as if she wishes she did not come.

Ty Lee opens her mouth and begins to speak.

When she leaves, she leaves with the knowledge that her dreams are absolutely real. And that they probably take place in a mirror world. She and Azula have created a deep bond by what happened between them in the Spirit World over six years ago, and it now gives them a connection in their dreams.

Azula is trapped, and Ty Lee needs to free her. Rei says she does not know how, but she knows that Ty Lee is telling the truth.

Once Ty Lee reaches the palace, Katara is already inside, undressing Azula and examining her.

Ty Lee wants to thank her, but there is no compassion or true to desire to heal Azula in Katara's eyes.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee runs to the barrier between she and Azula's respective prisons that night. Katara's healing came to a halt quite early, and she said that she needed to sleep on it. Zuko was accommodating, of course. Mai, not so thrilled about Katara staying with them.

Azula would hate it too, if she were conscious.

"Azula!" Ty Lee shouts, searching for the princess. "Azula!"

She has reached the barrier, but Azula is not there. She has reached the barrier _but Azula is not there_.


	4. Division

**Night Three Part II: D** ivision

* * *

Ty Lee has reached the barrier, but Azula is not there.

Perhaps she was just confused. It was odd that they were blocked off from each other, even if the concept of cages had made so much sense to them both. But the panic still surges through herm because _of course_ Azula would go missing.

Then she thinks that perhaps Azula is dying now, and that there is going to be irreparable damage. It could be if Azula is gone, then it means that she is close to death. That terrifies Ty Lee beyond belief, and she quickly sets her hand on the invisible wall and starts to run as fast as she can in one direction with her hand on it.

It burns beneath her palm, but she ignores it as she keeps running, keeps looking for some kind of imperfection or weakness in the seemingly unbreakable division between she and Azula.

Ty Lee keeps going for as long as she can, until she is out of breath. There is no escape. This seems to go on forever, as if she is trying to walk across the entire world. So she slows down, and tries to figure out if there is another way to reach Azula and figure out if she is okay.

She is still panting and catching her breath when she smells the smoke and sees the fire to her far left. Her forest is on fire, and her heart starts pounding. The desert that was Azula's is still intact and peaceful, without even a lick of wind.

But Ty Lee can even see the flames surging to scrape against the pinkish sky that is in perpetual sunrise. She thinks about what she is doing for a brief moment, and then runs at the fire with all of the energy that she still has left in her body.

The trees scratch at her cheekbone as she runs and can feel the heat against her skin. The fire in front of her is cerulean, but it has no source behind it. It just rages with no purpose or meaning, and Ty Lee starts to back away when the flames grow, crackling and raging.

She turns to go back and find another way around, but she sees a swarm of dragon-locusts coming at her. Ty Lee shivers, knowing that they are her absolute worst fear. One once stung her foot when she was in the mountains vacationing with her family. She never forgot. As Ty Lee developed more resentment, she hated how they swarmed together, how they screamed at night and how their bites burned and they chewed through nature relentlessly.

And now she thinks they are going to chew through her.

Alright, Ty Lee has a split second to decide between running headfirst into a wildfire or succumbing to the locusts soaring directly at her, and she decides to run into the fire. She holds back the tears in her eyes and the lump in her throat as she runs forward full force through the fire.

It burns her skin and she can feel the pain, but it starts to die down after she thinks she cannot take it anymore no matter what she does. And at the end of the charred woods, she finds herself in Azula's desert terrarium. Ty Lee must have done something right, and she runs forward to see Azula lying on a shining, hot slab of rock.

"Azula!" Ty Lee calls out, reaching for her.

Her wife opens her eyes and Ty Lee stumbles backwards, screaming. Her eyes are black as night, her skin cold. Not the flawless ivory with her red lips, but the cold of melting snow or freezing hands.

Ty Lee realizes too late that she is being attacked, and that she feels too helpless to fight back. Azula's open lips are terrifying, but she looks so much like the woman that Ty Lee loves truly, madly and deeply.

It is then that Ty Lee starts to crawl backwards as quickly as she can. She sees a glass bottle glittering in the sunlight and breaks it with her hand, feeling the excruciating pain as she is ripped to the bone, and she pulls out the bladed fan inside.

Her hand is not bone, as she thought, although it is red from pain. As Azula does descend on her, Ty Lee plunges the blades into her neck and feels the blood splash onto her face.

Ty Lee coughs, feeling disgusted by the heat on her and the feeling of betrayal to Azula.

But her wife, the person Ty Lee always feared not being able to stand up to, collapses beside Ty Lee. She is bleeding out, and Ty Lee knows not what to say when Azula's eyes flicker open, their natural gold, and Azula looks at the blood all over her and visibly panics.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula wakes abruptly, feeling the heat of blood on her as well. But, while Ty Lee is gazing at crimson fluid, Azula can only see white pouring from her punctured neck.

She reaches her fingertips towards her neck and then looks up at Ty Lee, her lips ajar and tasting of salt, sweat and the thick white fluid bubbling up into her mouth.

Ty Lee reaches forward as Azula rips the fan out of her neck and starts shaking her head. Azula watches the fan disintegrate in her hand, the metal falling over her. This is the sting of betrayal. The brutal, painful sensation of it.

The cuts do mend, Azula stops choking and feeling herself soaking with her own death. She gasps in and looks at Ty Lee.

"What are you?" Azula asks quietly, starting to move back to the slab her strange other self had rested on before.

"I could ask you the same," Ty Lee says and Azula slowly shakes her head.

"You tried to kill me."

"You were…" Ty Lee trails off as Azula looks at her. "Please trust me, Azula. Please just trust me."

Azula purses her lips, and at last nods. "I don't like this place. Let's find a way out."

"I could not agree more," Ty Lee says, standing up and taking Azula's hand.

Trust is hard, even after so many years. But it is there now.

They start walking, together, looking at their surroundings as closely as they can to look for a way out. Maybe Azula should just wake up. No, no she can't wake up. She cannot let her dream world with Ty Lee turn into a nightmare world.

They wind up in a cold cave, and it is a relief from the desert heat, even to Azula. Slowly, they walk inside and the darkness is impossible. Azula tries to light her hand and finds her bending gone. She is in a dream, she supposes, and so she looks to Ty Lee for guidance.

The two of them walk for a ways, into the darkness. Azula has always been afraid of the dark, secretly, to herself. She always feared it as a little girl, and she still is made uncomfortable by it now, unless she feels safe.

But she feels divided from her world completely, and this place is frightening.

Suddenly, Ty Lee's hand slips away from Azula's.

"Where are you?" Azula shouts and she has no response. Her voice just echoes in the pitch black darkness. " _Where are you_? Answer me!"

She looks around and steps towards a pitfall. Azula catches herself just in time and slowly slides onto her knees, feeling around and only finding air. She reaches and can feel knuckles clutching onto the rock side, but Ty Lee is not there.

It seems as if they are apart, and Azula cannot hear her. The princess reaches and nearly drops Ty Lee. She reaches to her left, looking for a handhold as her heart pounds, but all she finds is a chain of heavy metal.

Azula clenches her jaw, realizing in pain what she is supposed to do. She latches the chain around her arm for support, ignoring the sweat she is breaking out into, and she pulls her companion up with it.

"Are you alive?" Azula asks softly.

"Yes," Ty Lee responds. "Thank you for saving me. Let's turn around."

Azula nods, certainly liking that idea. They head towards the light, disappointed that the cave did not lead to an escape.

Once they make it out, they walk around the outside of the mountain and sit down among bushes. They catch their breath, and Azula's eyes lock with Ty Lee's for a moment.

"I don't think this place is what we thought it was," Azula says as Ty Lee reaches for her hand and gently takes it.

"I don't either."


	5. Echo

**Night Four: E** cho

* * *

Alone in their dream world, Azula and Ty Lee clung to each other, and slowly watched the other fall asleep, knowing that they would wake in a world without her at their side.

Ty Lee slept first, and so she wakes first, curled beside Azula's unconscious body. She can hear the sound of a very gentle waterfall; it is the type of soothing that she had when rain pounded on roofs and poured down on Kyoshi Island, or even here while in bed with Azula.

She vaguely remembers Katara setting it up, and even more vaguely remembers Katara healing Azula. Katara eased the fever and tried to say something consoling that was just awkward and Ty Lee wished that she wouldn't.

Now Princess Ty Lee sits and waits to join Azula again. But she is interrupted.

"Ty Lee, you need to go somewhere. Now," Mai insists as her sister-in-law just stares at her blankly. "I hate going places and doing things, but I can't handle this."

Ty Lee sighs and frowns faintly, knowing she has just been desperately waiting until she can go back to sleep. But living a life just waiting for sleep... that is no way to live. Not when Ty Lee has so many people who love her, and a child she hasn't spoken to in nearly two days.

"Where do you want to go?" Ty Lee inquires in the most defeated tone she has ever used.

"Wherever you want."

"Well, I want to stay here."

"You sound like Az ─ _me_ or something." The correction is too belated, and Ty Lee is again forcibly been made aware of how screwed up she is. And how everyone is convinced that Azula is going to die.

Ty Lee does halfheartedly shower and get dressed and attempt to look beautiful. But it feels pointless to her. She goes to check on Mizuki, but it is utterly pointless. The little girl is at her friend's house for a sleepover, probably because Zuko is made so uncomfortable by Ty Lee's abrupt neglect.

She and Mai wind up at a bar, and a nice one. There is music being played by a man with careless dark hair, and she walks towards the shady corner. Mai does not protest their placement, but it is unusual for Ty Lee to try to hide from everyone.

Mai sits with her in uncomfortable silence for too long, and then she gets up, sighing at how she wishes Zuko or someone more _social_ was doing this, and she goes to find one of those weird, colorful drinks Ty Lee likes, and utterly demands that the man playing some weird instrument thing Mai doesn't know the name of, but makes musical sounds, and tells him to play something _not_ about depressing break-ups.

It works. It does work, and Mai is actually relieved to be stolen away from a calm tavern and taken away to somewhere smoky and smelling of twelve kinds of perfume. The kind of place that Ty Lee was adept at sneaking into, and used to drag Mai and Zuko and Azula along with her during those times that they were not loathing friends or a broken home.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula watches the water peasant from afar, feeling like a ghost. She has felt like a ghost more times than she would like to. Little girl ignored, insane girl made invisible, widow-to-be too uncomfortable to look at for long.

Katara does seem to know what she is doing, and Ty Lee looks far less pale.

"Her fever is gone," Katara says openly and Azula nods once. "I think I might be pushing things, though. And I'm really hungry."

Azula does not acknowledge Katara at all, while Zuko thanks her and takes her to go get food.

The princess moves to sit on the bed when Mai knocks on the door, a rapping of her knuckles quickly, just before she barges in regardless of Azula's wishes.

"Let's go somewhere. I know you hate hearing that. But─"

"..."

"Don't do that. You're not allowed to do that."

"..."

"Ugh. You have to know that you can't be one of those weird wife people who burn themselves alive with their spouses."

"..."

"Fine, ignore everyone and the world and your kid and your job. Go right ahead and see if I care at all." Mai walks away and Azula smiles faintly to herself.

She lies down beside Ty Lee and waits for sleep that does not want to come.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee is feeling electric tonight, and nothing can bring her down. Mai seems to want to stop her, but she just keeps near Ty Lee, keeping her on a tight leash to make sure she does not do anything she will truly regret. Perhaps this is how she tries to cope, tries to lose herself.

Mai has spent a good deal of time sitting on the sidelines of parties, dances and galas, and she can tell by how people dance why they are dancing. Some people dance for pleasure, some dance to get laid, some dance to remember; Ty Lee is dancing to forget.

Or maybe she is just avoiding thoughts of Azula; that could easily be the case. Her dancing fades and she leans against the bar, trying to mask her lost breath. Her skin is streaked with sweat and she hopes it does not show the tears she sobbed in the bathroom. A man buys two drinks for Ty Lee and Mai takes both of them before striding across the room.

"Have you talked to Katara since she got here? Maybe she knows if Azula will..." Mai is smart enough to trail off.

"No. She probably doesn't want to, anyway," Ty Lee offers with a wide, plastic grin.

Some smile because they're happy, Ty Lee smiles because she is afraid.

"I know we don't talk about our feelings, but if you have anything you want to say, I... I'm pretty good at listening and not offering my opinion," Mai says after downing a gulp of her drink. Ty Lee is still studying her glass, as if it has the answers to why her life is so broken now.

"I'm fine," Ty Lee insists and Mai swallows.

"You're not fine. You haven't left her. Don't be one of those weird wife people who burn themselves alive with their spouses," Mai says and Ty Lee ignores her and finds someone else to entertain her.

Mai has nothing to say, deciding that taking Ty Lee out was probably counterproductive.

Maybe they should have gone to some boring opera or something.

When Mai at last helps Ty Lee home, whom has lost count of her drinks and the hours in the night long ago, the princess does not make it very far before curling up on a sofa.

"I'm so tired," Ty Lee whispers and Mai swallows, awkwardly being yanked down. "I'm so tired, but I have to get to..."

She falls silent, and slowly, her tight grip around Mai's wrist ceases.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

All there is in the dream world is an echo. Azula walks through the desert, wondering what trick there is this time. But she just isn't there. Ty Lee just isn't there.

Azula feels this blinding white light around her, but she is just a spectator as it swirls around and away from her body.

Just echoes of what she thought would be perfect.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee wakes on the sofa screaming and trying not to cry. Her migraine and dry mouth don't matter at all.

Because it's gone. She wasn't there. The world where Azula is still alive is _gone_.

And she cannot stomach it at all.


	6. Fear

**Night Five: F** ear

* * *

"I know you can't hear me right now, but I'm sorry that I betrayed you," Ty Lee whispers at Azula's bedside. The princess does not stir, of course, despite Katara trying her best to heal her.

Ty Lee can only stare, her hangover nothing compared to the turmoil within her over what she did to her true love. She feels wracked with guilt and thinks that perhaps Azula is going to die now. She has genuinely been under the impression that her visits are the only thing keeping Azula alive.

She has never been so afraid in her entire life, and she does not know what she is supposed to do about it, or how she will ever recover.

Ty Lee attempts, futilely, to lie beside Azula and go back to sleep. The curtains are drawn and it is perfectly dark. Ty Lee is exhausted, and she should be able to drift off. But there is nothing; the magic is gone and Ty Lee is so afraid.

"Azula, please," Ty Lee whispers to what might as well be a corpse. "Azula... I love you so much. I'm sorry and I'm scared, and please, please don't leave me."

Ty Lee keeps begging _please don't leave me_ until the words are just sounds that don't make sense, and her mouth tastes only of her own tears.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula wakes feeling so frightened. She does not want to admit to her trembling hands and agony as she thinks about how painful her dream was without Ty Lee in it. But this is how it is, and this is how it will be. Azula looks at the woman beside her and wonders how she could have possibly been left alone.

Azula kisses Ty Lee gently on the neck and can feel her pulse. Despite being feverish or cold or sweaty, there is a pulse there. And the beating of Ty Lee's heart is the only encouragement Azula needs to do everything in her power to save her wife.

Because Azula is powerful and Azula always gets what she wants. And she wants Ty Lee to live.

 _And she wants to dream about Ty Lee too._

So much, so desperately. Azula leaves her bed and does not bother brushing her hair, teeth or getting dressed, as the rest of the family has become accustomed to.

"Water peasant," demands the very disheveled woman walking in on Katara's quiet breakfast with Mai. "Come start healing her. Or at least look up something better to do. I want her fixed."

Azula bares her teeth and Mai thinks she has gone very far down this crevice, and into a black abyss. Mai really wishes Azula had decided to go out with her, because this nightmare of a woman is depressing.

"I'll do what I can. I _am_ doing what I can," Katara snarls and Azula does not stand down.

"I want to call in a second opinion," Azula says coolly. "Your husband."

Katara squints at Azula. "I don't know what Aang has to do with anything. He has more important things to do than heal ─"

"There is _nothing_ more important than saving her!" screams Azula and Katara takes a deep breath.

"Why do you want Aang?" Katara asks softly and Azula glares for a moment, still seething about the very thought that anyone could think that Ty Lee's life was not of the utmost importance.

"Because of some very strange dreams."

Azula is gone, sinking into the shadows before anyone can ask.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Both princesses go to sleep, hoping that their dreams will not be vacant of each other this time.

They both find themselves in a very odd house of mirrors. Azula sees a desert away from her, and Ty Lee a jungle. The respective terrariums have already been figured out, and they are beginning to think that perhaps this is all going to devolve into a bunch of sick games of trying to get from one to the other.

Or maybe it is something real and serious. Perhaps these dreams are helping heal or hurt the unconscious woman in the real world.

Azula and Ty Lee both set off through the tunnel lined with mirrors, watching the odd distorted images, twitchy. Anything could attack them at this point.

Ty Lee hears the scuff of a foot and calls out, "Azula!?"

Azula hears her call and replies, "Ty Lee?! Where are you?"

They both frantically search until they look up at the weird mirrors they both have been avoiding save for the quick glance. And in it, trapped on the other side of the glass, is the other princess. How wonderful, how sick.

"I hate mirrors," Azula whispers as she walks towards Ty Lee.

Her hand touching glass when it should be touching Ty Lee's skin makes her livid again. She lashes out to the mirror across the room from she and Ty Lee's greeting place, and smashes it into smithereens. Ty Lee recoils briefly, and Azula finds no satisfaction.

"Where were you?" Azula demands of Ty Lee and the acrobat frowns.

"I'm sorry. I didn't fall asleep by you. I got drunk with Mai ─"

"And what boys bought you drinks and fucked you?" Azula snarls and Ty Lee wants to punch through the mirror to reach her. No, no, no. This hurts too much. "You would rather be out partying, while I'm doing everything in my power to save you, to save us."

Azula looks livid and Ty Lee is trying to hold back the stream of tears threatening to escape.

"Please, Azula..."

But the halls echo before they can complete their argument.

Wailing of a small child that starts shattering the mirrors. Azula and Ty Lee, despite their anger, chase after each other every time another mirror breaks, separating them, but they get to the end of the line, and both wake to find the noise that broke their meeting place.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

"Mommy," says Mizuki softly as she pushes her way into the bedroom. Ty Lee wakes and realizes that this is what tore her away from Azula, when they were so close.

Ty Lee has the horrid instinct to shout at her child for doing that. But Mizuki does not know, Mizuki does not know, and so Ty Lee sits up and walks to her, glancing back at Azula with every small, sliding step.

"What do you need, baby girl?" Ty Lee whispers gently, forcibly prying her gaze from Azula and lifting Mizuki into her arms. The child clings more tightly than she ever has in her life and Ty Lee feels the twinge of regret.

Regret tastes like a very intricately mixed poison that hurts and burns and stings and makes you retch before you just die.

"I'm scared," Mizuki whispers and Ty Lee gently lays her on her bed and settles down beside her.

"Okay," Ty Lee says softly, wondering where her maternal side wandered off to. She has been so obsessed with Azula that she forgot the most important thing she and Azula have. "Why are you scared?"

"I don't know," Mizuki says softly as Ty Lee cautiously turns out the lamp. That does not bother Mizuki, so hopefully it is not fear of the dark.

Ty Lee lies down beside her and Mizuki crawls and presses herself against her mother. She feels odd in Ty Lee's arms, but Ty Lee knows it must be done.

"Why are you scared?" Ty Lee asks and Mizuki frowns.

"I've been having these dreams," Mizuki says quietly and Ty Lee tenses. That seems to frighten her more and Ty Lee feels awful. "A lot of them. And they're really scary and there's this desert and I keep looking for mother and she isn't there."

Ty Lee's eyes slowly widen as she tries to make sense of what she has just been told.

 _Wow_.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

"Mother," whispers Mizuki and Azula instantly feels acid inside of her. Her daughter ripping Azula from her reverie makes Azula livid. But then she realizes that she cannot harm her child more than she has, and she walks to her.

"What do you need?" Azula asks, a bit too coldly. She swallows, knowing it is not the right way to make Mizuki feel, but sometimes Azula does not know what else to do.

"I'm scared," Mizuki says, taking Azula's smooth hand in her grubby little one, and tugging on her.

Azula does not want to leave Ty Lee. She _cannot_ leave Ty Lee. Not now. Not _now_ , but Azula has no choice, and so she sighs and lets Mizuki lead her to her room. Azula sits beside her on the bed and keeps itching to go back to Ty Lee.

"What can I do to make you go back to sleep?" Azula asks and Mizuki scratches her head and plays with her dark hair.

"Stay with me," Mizuki says, grabbing at Azula. And Princess Azula cannot deny her. "And help me find mommy."

Azula's eyes flash at that. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"I keep dreaming about trying to find her and there's this jungle and I keep screaming and trying to find her, but I can't," Mizuki breathes and Azula slowly inhales and exhales.

This permeates more than just Ty Lee's deathbed.


	7. Giving

**Night Six Part I: G** iving

* * *

Azula always was unsure on how she was supposed to give herself thoroughly to someone else. She only could see herself and her future. The problem with others is that they are unpredictable, and Azula needs to predict everything.

In fact, right now she is in a state of utter distress. Because today was supposed to be a day of research for her, but she was kidnapped by Mai and Zuko and bribed by two pleading little children to come with them to some stupid play thing.

Why this has anything to appeal to children, Azula is clueless. She kind of wanted to stab her own eyes out when her parents forced her into the dusty, overheated theater on Ember Island to watch that horrific play again and again and again...

But Azula supposes she does not really know her daughter. She does not know if she has _ever_ known her daughter, and so how would she know if the child liked plays for some inexplicable reason?

She does turn to the little one when they at last sit down. Maybe she should have taken up Mai's offer to go to that bar so her family would be less worried about her. The looks she gets make her want to burn all of them alive or perhaps just break their faces in.

 _"You have to know you can't be one of those weird wife people who toss themselves on their spouse's pyre."_ Mai needs to stop being right about things. It is very unwelcome.

"Why do you want to see this horrible thing again?" Azula asks quietly as her daughter sits there patiently. "Don't you like... climbing trees or paper dolls or something?"

Mizuki gives her a look that makes Azula just sit slightly back in her chair.

It quite reminds the princess of how every time she tries to get her daughter something, it is a hobby or favorite that she outgrew a year or so ago. Azula attempted to be involved in the planning of her lavish birthday party, and Ty Lee laughed because she thought Azula was joking when she proposed a theme that Mizuki stopped liking when she was three.

But, while the princess is good at most everything, she will admit that she is clueless about gifts. Firstly, she prefers getting other people to do such things for her. And while her competitive streak has always made her want to out-thoughtful her wife and ick brother, she never wins at that. She tries, and then is up showed by something so madly thoughtful that gifts should be outlawed in the Fire Nation.

Ty Lee is happy with everything Azula gets her. Well, actually, no, she isn't. But, despite the fact that Ty Lee constantly comes up with something that is so impressive that Azula wants to scream, she also pads the presents for her family with gifts that she wants for herself, and then just casually mentions that if they don't like it, they can give it to her.

She didn't try to hide it for a second. Once she bought Zuko an entire make-up kit and nail polish set. He gave it to Ty Lee, as she kind of babbled something about how mascara would really accent his eyes.

Azula really hates those memories. She finds that she has completely torn up the parchment poster she was examining after swiping it from the wall. The paper is on her lap, lying in broken, ragged pieces.

"I want to," Mizuki says softly, "see this because I want to be an actress."

"No," Azula says without meaning to. "No, you can't be an actress. You are a princess."

Mizuki frowns. "Well, mama and Uncle Zuko said I could."

"Well, I say you can't and my vote counts for easily triple theirs." Azula then falls silent because her young, still having all of her baby teeth and throwing tantrums, child is now ignoring her. "You can be whatever you want to be," Azula says, sighing, but it does no good.

Azula recalls thinking she would be quite good at something like that. Given the lying habit, and how gorgeous she was and the fact that the woman her father was _dating_ was an actress or maybe a singer... dancer? Azula doesn't remember anymore, but she was the _only_ one Azula liked and didn't intentionally scare away.

She now realizes that that woman just knew how to play the game. The sole reason a young Azula liked her so much was because she showered Azula with all attention and told her she was magnificent, while father stopped watching anything unless it involved fire and lightning.

Anyway, the moment her father saw Azula trying to emulate her, he was rid of that girl for good, and his only explanation was one that a ten year old didn't understand, but a woman nearly thirty does.

 _'Her only good parts are between her thighs.'_

That permanently poisoned anything in entertainment for Azula.

Oh, oh wow, that...

Azula married an entertainer. Azula married an entertainer who was completely similar to her father's girlfriend of two months.

Oh...

She is very grateful when the show starts, and she can distract herself with it. Her mind, however, is fixated completely on making sure that she is home in time. And she also is thinking of any way to exploit the dream world in order to break through the mirrors that kept them separate.

And her desire to see what Mizuki was talking about. These dreams could be important. Maybe they could be real or tell Azula something. She _needed_ to be home with Ty Lee and awaiting the Avatar completely prepared.

Instead, she is sitting in this theater.

She can feel time ticking away within her. Slipping by and perhaps leading Ty Lee to her death.

Azula just chews on her lip and focuses on her own thoughts.

Mai and Zuko are gone at intermission, and Azula thinks she has just been designated babysitter. Then they both wail that they have to pee and Azula gets up and escorts them.

The Fire Lord and Fire Lady are hidden in an alcove, which is probably not the most dignified of positions.

Zuko says, "Azula is doing way better than I expected. Alright, maybe I think she looks like she just ripped someone's jugular out with her teeth, but I didn't think we'd ever get her out of that room."

Mai almost laughs. "I think it's because you threatened to let your mother abscond with Mizuki."

Azula tugs on the two girls, who yelp in surprise. They both insisted on holding her hands, which Azula barely tolerates. She also barely tolerated how awful they are at walking through crowds, walking up stairs, passing by anything without demanding it, and even just waiting in line and even going to the bathroom without an adult.

She has just caught sight of Mai and Zuko acting oddly. And as she presses a bit closer, hiding behind a portly and extravagantly dressed elderly couple, she can hear their every word.

Mai whispers, "She's doing okay, but... not _that_ okay. Ty Lee is the really disgustingly optimistic glue of our family. Like, I feel we're all just getting constantly attacked by bears, and she's the only person with the first aid kit and the mace."

"That's..." Zuko's brow is knit with confusion.

"I wish they were reversed," Mai says softly and Zuko's eyes flash. "Don't look at me like that. I don't want anything to happen to those horrible, soul-sucking harpy-wasps I call my best friends. But Ty Lee is... better for everybody."

"Are you suggesting that my sister should die instead of Ty Lee because Ty Lee is better at life and more helpful?"

"She's more stable. I know we like our leaders good and traumatized, but imagine your mother times a million and your sister is your dad."

Zuko can visualize that. It makes him queasy.

"You've thought this through a lot," Zuko says with a small grimace.

"Yeah. Either way it's horrible. Do you think I actually want one of my best friends to die? But..." Mai stops. "The Boiling Rock. You don't think that if Ty Lee had let me die she would be at all remotely okay? They'd both lose it. It was a matter of giving up one or the other."

"I don't know how that relates to this." Zuko walks ahead very quickly and takes a piece of garbage out of Izumi's hand.

Mai isn't really sure either.

It's not her choice.

Azula is frozen for a long while, with the thought that Mai would prefer that she were dead.

But her hands are tugged on again, and she is stuck back in the play, despite wanting to run.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee has been lying on the chaise lounge across from Azula's bed, waiting for the day to go by. Katara looks very unnerved by it, but she doesn't comment. She has been filled in by Mai and Zuko, and it is fairly impossible to miss the fact that Ty Lee is disturbingly dedicated to Azula.

Mai muttered something about her being one of those weird wife people who throw themselves onto their spouse's pyre. And Zuko gave her a look, and she sighed, and Katara tried not to feel so awkward.

Zuko knocks on the door and Katara is grateful to have the eyes off of her as she did the basic maintenance of a fever and anything else internal that can keep her alive in her sleep.

"Ty Lee," Zuko suggests and she is silent. Her eyes do leave Katara, at least. "Do you want to go see that show Mizuki keeps begging about? It's that one you like, I think. The one you bought me a costume from for my birthday and then took it."

Princess Ty Lee does not respond.

Zuko's stomach churns. Because even at her lowest of lows, Ty Lee had a fire inside of her to pick herself up. Mostly because she was always the only person holding her family together, even with Zuko and Mai helping.

"Alright. I'll see you tonight." He leaves, even though he wishes that he could convince her to come.

Mai is waiting, juggling the two overly excited and very concerned about their hair little girls.

Once they are out, and Mai and Zuko are mostly alone as they keep their eyes on the running children, there is a moment of silence that is definitely about Ty Lee.

And Mai says very quietly, "I don't know what we're going to do if she loses it. Can you imagine that?"

"Yes. It would... I mean, yeah." Zuko just kind of exhales awkwardly.

"I kind of wish they were reversed sometimes," she says softly and Zuko's eyes flash. "Don't look at me like that. At least we know how to cope with Azula, and I am one hundred percent certain she has never even heard of this show despite Mizuki telling her twenty times."

"How does that make it better?" Zuko demands.

"Because I'm pretty sure that it's a lot worse for the survivor than the one who dies. Azula's not even gone yet and Ty Lee is a freaky hollow shell checked out of the world entirely." Mai then swallows. "Look, Azula's not the kind of person who would ever give herself up for somebody else. Even Ty Lee. Probably any of us. She'd cope, probably, and if she didn't, I'm pretty sure we could threaten to let your mother abscond with Mizuki and she'd snap into it."

"You've thought this through a lot," Zuko says with a small grimace.

"Yeah. Either way it's horrible. Do you think I actually want one of my best friends to die? But..." Mai stops. "The Boiling Rock. You don't think that if Ty Lee had let me die she would be at all remotely okay? They'd both lose it. It was a matter of giving up one for the other."

"I don't know how that relates to this." Zuko walks ahead very quickly and takes a piece of garbage out of Izumi's hand.

Mai isn't really sure either.

It's not her choice.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula hates the unplanned. The play ate enough time, but now her horrid family has decided to stop for some weird restaurant that makes odd flavors of senbei. Azula refuses the dessert.

Mai keeps looking at Zuko as if she is proving a point, and Azula feels rather unsettled by it all.

She gets home and thinks that she might have missed her time, but it is not too late. Not too late.

Azula is getting ready to lie down and go back into the world where everything is strange but makes sense because Ty Lee is there, when someone walks in.

"Will you do my hair like the lead lady?" whispers Mizuki and Azula hesitates.

 _No, I want to go to sleep next to your comatose mother so I can have trippy dreams about kissing her._

"Yes. But... you need to go to bed at a normal hour."

It hurts to walk away.

But what Mai and Zuko whispered hurt a lot more.

There is still time for sleep tonight.

There is not infinite time to brace herself for what may come.

Azula makes sense of the Boiling Rock metaphor in a way Mai probably didn't intend.

She is beginning to wonder if these dreams are leading up to the two of them making a choice.

To decide which reality should be real.

And Azula hopes and hopes she is just being paranoid.


	8. Hope

**Night Six Part II: H** ope

* * *

Azula looks at her daughter as she brushes her hair, which somehow is in a deplorable disarray.

"You're hurting me! Who taught you how to brush hair?" Mizuki whines hysterically while Azula is being as gentle as she possibly can.

Well, Azula just pouts her lips to that. She has no idea what Mizuki is going on about. Azula is wonderful at brushing hair, and she thinks that the motion is very soothing right now. If Ty Lee is gone, Mizuki is all she will have left.

And then Azula swallows. When mother was gone, Azula was all father had left. It was torture to be that to him, to be all he had in the world and have so much to live up to. To never have to disappoint him.

Azula _needs_ to talk to Ty Lee. She _has_ to. The princess continues brushing until Mizuki yawns sleepily and extends her arms to be carried to her bed. Azula takes her, sets her down and for a moment just doesn't want to let go.

She wants to be as loveless as she once one, but the idea of losing both of them terrifies her to the soul. Well, if someone told Azula she would be such a _family_ person, she would have laughed at them or even _hurt_ them for that matter.

But Mizuki's eyes are drooping as she curls up, her hair done like the beautiful girl in the play Azula does not recall the plot of or the names, despite Mizuki saying it over and over.

"Your dreams," Azula says softly and Mizuki looks at her for a moment. "About the [insert] and mama?"

Mizuki purses her lips and thinks about it for a long time. "Mhm. Yeah, I've been having them a lot. But they've been just a little weird. I'm not afraid of nightmares or anything like that."

Azula picks at her lip. "No, no. Of course you aren't. You are my child, after all."

 _My child_ alarms Azula even though it is a casual and true phrase. She does not want to think about a world in which Mizuki is only hers. But when her daughter holds her hands out, gesturing for Azula to hug her for a _very_ long time before Azula actually realizes she means it, the princess has a little, barely burning ember of hope for their family.

She awkwardly hugs the little girl, before starting to walk away.

"Stay here," Mizuki orders and Azula shakes her head.

"I can't," Azula says coldly, refusing to let Ty Lee slip away in their dream world again. But Azula looks at her trembling lip and sighs. "Tomorrow."

Azula does not mean it, but Mizuki believes it, and that is good enough for now, as the princess hurries and hopes to catch Ty Lee in time.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee does not have that spark of hope that is within her wife. It is long gone or perhaps it was never present in the first place. She is used to taking care of Azula. That is second nature to her, but everything Azula has gotten herself tangled in has been fixable. None of it has been like this.

And Ty Lee has never felt so useless before.

"I have cinnamon cake for you," Zuko offers as hopefully as he can. Ty Lee just looks up at him. "Please eat it. I know it's your favorite, and I had them put tons of that gross sugar stuff you like on it."

He holds it in front of her for a long time like a master offering its pet a bone, and Ty Lee begrudgingly takes it when her stomach betrays her by growling and pleading. She takes the fork as well, with a very long sigh, and begins to eat it.

Zuko hesitates before asking, "Are you watching her again tonight?"

"Yes," Ty Lee says softly, and her pretty, affable personality has vanished. It unsettles and chills Zuko down to the bone. "Katara doesn't seem to want to stay up with her."

"Nobody needs to, is what Katara said."

"What Katara said is that this all is pointless because she's going to die anyway and it's just drawing out everyone else's pain," Ty Lee snaps shrilly, and the cake is instantly forgotten. She does not think she would be capable of an appetite if she were starving to death.

Fire Lord Zuko takes a few deep breaths. He is scared of that. _Very_ scared of that.

"You love her and that─"

"Does _nothing_!" Ty Lee shrinks, never having felt so small before.

Zuko stands there, mute, unsure what to say or do.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula wakes in her desert and she has never been more grateful. She gets up as quickly as she can and goes to try to find Ty Lee. Of course the division will still be there, even though Azula has the incessant hope that maybe it just lasted for a little while.

She misses her so much. She wants to tell her about that awful play, and _mostly_ about what Mai and Zuko said about them both. Azula runs towards the jungle in the distance, but she stops when she sees the lightning storm crackling and raging in it.

It might not be a jungle; it might be a rainforest.

Azula blinks, thinking of the fact that there is glass holding her wife in. Well, that glass reaches to the _sky_ , and rain could not drown her... but it _could_ , and the hope that this world is benevolent are very quickly drying up.

This is a dark, horrid place, and Azula does not know why they are trapped here.

But so help her, she will find out.

Ty Lee wakes as well, coughing on the water that gets into her throat. She looks around, her heart pounding, scanning for Azula. Her eyes quickly catch on a path that seems rather obvious; it goes towards high ground, and she cannot hear herself think over the thunder, and her clothes are soaked with water.

She starts running that way, and hears screaming. Her first thought is Azula, and then her second is the fears they both faced once. Then, she runs faster; she _does_ know those screams. _Those_ are the scream of her little girl.

Azula has heard them too, and they converge, despite the invisible wall between them.

"Where is she?" Azula demands and Ty Lee shakes her head with her lips parted. Azula looks over her shoulder and gazes out at the way the terrarium fades into darkness. And the screams are coming from there. "Run that way. Stay in my sight."

Ty Lee wipes the water from her upper lip, removes as many of her soaking garments as she can, and complies.

They run, and run, and continue running, until the dry heat on Azula starts becoming cold, and Ty Lee stops feeling the rain and hearing the whistling of the leaves and chatter of jungle creatures that she never saw.

The precipice of darkness is right there and Azula holds up her hand for them to stop.

Ty Lee turns to her, still unable to shake the screaming.

"Listen," Azula says, "I don't want to think about what's in there."

"What do you mean?" Ty Lee whispers, stepping towards the glass.

"Because one of us is obviously dying, and I'm not ready for that," Azula admits as Ty Lee frowns very faintly. "I don't want to choose which of us is better off dead. Or alive. Or whatever."

Ty Lee blinks, water dripping from her eyes and hair.

"So, you think if we both go in, only one of us is coming out? It isn't like we understand this place at _all_ ," Ty Lee says quietly. "We don't know what happens if we go in."

"That's what I'm afraid of."

They stare at each other through the glass prison, and hope for the best.


	9. Intensity

**Hypnagogia Part I** **: I** ntensity

* * *

Azula and Ty Lee do not turn to look at each other as they go into the darkness at once.

The nebulous grey mist makes it impossible to tell if the division between them is still there or not. But they can still hear the sound of Mizuki, and they are not going to stop walking until they reach her; that did not need to be said between them for it to be understood.

Azula breathes in and can smell fresh rain on stone, and cold winter air. None of it makes sense, but she does not pay attention. Because she knows that she is in a dream, and she knows that she can still hear Mizuki in pain or danger.

Her mind is focused on the fact that Mizuki had spoken about being present in her mothers' dreams before and she very well could be facing just what Azula and Ty Lee had been up against before; they had their worst fears thrown at them.

Princess Azula realizes, as she feels her heart rate climbing and can see light ahead of her, that she has no idea what Mizuki is afraid of her. She realizes that she had no idea what Ty Lee's fears were until she saw them, and that she never asked further about them either.

It is a very belated thought, because she turns to look over her shoulder and sees Ty Lee joining her, reaching out one hand as they can see the nearly blinding light on the other side of the dark, dank, eerie tunnel.

Azula grabs Ty Lee's slippery hand without hesitation and they walk into the intensifying white light.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

It is impossible to tell how much time passed while they were immersed in the light, but they were, and that is simply a fact. But when Azula and Ty Lee have broken free, their first breath of air hurts. It is agonizing on their lungs, but neither of them makes much noise except for a few, small, faint and pained whimpers.

Azula looks up first, despite Ty Lee having recovered more quickly. The truth is, the acrobat just does not want to figure out where she is. While she is relieved that the screaming has ceased, and there is _no_ worse sound than your child in pain, she is frightened by that change. The thought of rescuing Mizuki _was_ the beacon that drew them here.

"Look," Azula whispers, nudging Ty Lee.

Ty Lee glances up and sees a wasteland in front of her.

It is familiar, very familiar. She thinks that it is most certainly the innermost circle of Caldera, but it is not. There is more rubble than city, and the mist around them is so thick that she steps closer and closer to Azula until she wraps her arm around her wife's body and refuses to let go.

"Can you see the palace?" Ty Lee whispers as she squints through the fog.

The mist around them is not impenetrable. It shifts and she can make out certain landmarks, although they are distorted and eerie.

"We need to get to higher ground," Azula says softly, and she turns and starts walking towards the taller rubble before Ty Lee can grab her closer and pull her into the kiss that crossed her mind.

They start climbing as soon as they find the blackened and charred ramps that lead upwards. Slowly, the two of them are mostly above the mist and fog, and they can see the most of it is dark, like smoke.

Azula shifts her gaze higher and _can_ see the palace, but it looks so very far away, and she does not know if she will be able to make it there by morning. She _wants_ to make it there by morning.

"Maybe we should just wait it out until we wake up," Azula offers and Ty Lee rubs her lips together uncomfortably. "What?"

"I don't know if we're waking up from this place," Ty Lee says after swallowing a lump in her throat.

Azula dislikes that answer. "What? You think you're going to die?"

"I'm scared to die," Ty Lee whispers, hating to admit it. "But I'm more scared of you dying is the thing. I just don't know. I'm way more scared of both of us being stuck here."

"So, you're scared of every scenario other than us just waking up and all of this was just a nightmare. Our life is perfect and back to normal?" Azula's disapproval is unapologetic.

"There's nothing wrong with that," Ty Lee hisses and Azula just shrugs, averting her eyes.

"Our life _can_ be normal, but we have to get back to the real world, and I have to save you from your coma, and talk to the Avatar. He's meeting with me tomorrow. It's a waste of time and energy to go to that palace," Azula says bitterly and Ty Lee sits down on top of the broken stone building.

Azula clenches her jaw.

"What if this is what's real?" Ty Lee asks as they stop again. "What if it is? And what about Mizuki? What if she's _really here_?"

Azula just shakes her head as she looks up towards the sky. It is not right. It is papery beneath the clouds of ash. None of this is at all reality, and Azula will not accept that. This might not be as _unreal_ as her visions, but it still is not _reality_.

"Well, either a very weird volcano erupted and everyone decided to take a sudden vacation, or we're in an awful dream." She adjusts her sleeve and keeps walking.

"Remember when I went to go talk to my aura reader about dreams?" Ty Lee asks and Azula shrugs. "She talked about astral projection. And how that this kind of thing was possible."

"I was _going to_ ask the Avatar tomorrow. If tomorrow even..." Azula scrunches up her nose. Time does not properly make sense here. "Let's go back that way. It's counterintuitive, but that makes it smart."

Ty Lee has no idea what Azula even means by that, but she leaps down and decides to follow the princess. Azula just looks around, feeling the intensity swelling inside of her. Ty Lee sticks closely with her, their hands touching as they travel through what once was a market square.

There are remnants of _life_ here, but Azula thinks it must be just whatever her nightmares saw fit to construct.

A sign is at the end, near the entrance to the market and what seems to be a derelict village.

 _Welcome to Hypnagogia_

"What does that mean?" Azula asks, narrowing her eyes. Her lip twists as she tries to think, knowing she has heard it somewhere before.

Ty Lee rubs her face. "I've heard it too, I think."

They both are lost in thought about it, and about the fact that perhaps this is a real town, when they see a flash of light, and then a horrible, soul shattering wail.

"What is that?" Ty Lee screams as she stumbles backwards.

Azula never believed in ghosts, even if she encountered spirits. She thought that human beings were the only monsters. But whatever is rushing at she and Ty Lee is most certainly something sick and supernatural.

They spring into action as the rotting flesh comes at them. It is or was a person, and it seems to be trying to tell them something, but it is moving at them in a predatory manner at the same time.

Blue fire lights in Azula's palm, while Ty Lee moves into a fighting stance, and two more of them rise up, pleading more with their unintelligible, shrieking, wailing, begging, like sobbing widows. The two women stand, waiting, wondering if they should fight or not.

That question is answered when a tendril hits Ty Lee's ankle and pulls her down, crashing into the hard, slick cobblestones. Azula strikes with fire and lightning as the tendrils come at her and the begging, crying zombies come at them both with the combat skills of military experts.

Martial arts, in fact. _Exactly_ martial arts.

Azula and Ty Lee rip their necrotic flesh to shreds, but their hearts are pounding by the time it is done, and the smoke does not clear. The smell of decaying flesh does not fade, and Azula and Ty Lee cannot stop hearing the crying and shouted, warbled words that they did not understand.

Ty Lee feels the tendril on her ankle that tried to rip her from Azula again and she throws herself into her wife's arms.

"Am I allowed to actually be scared now?" Ty Lee gasps as she leans into Azula more fiercely. "That was..."

"Much more intense than those fears we faced?" Azula asks softly, not disagreeing with that statement. She thinks of the containment cells, and how she distinctly thought of them as that. And she then thinks of how the fears were so specific, and of this new place.

Azula _wants_ it to make perfect logical sense, and for her to have just put it all together, solved the problem and woken them both up. But she clenches her jaw and sighs. She made no progress.

"We just need to keep walking. We need to find a way out and back into the _real world_ ," Azula says as she stands up. "I don't care how many of those things are in my way."

Ty Lee looks at her, grabs Azula by the wrist, and kisses her as hard as she can.

Azula savors it. Ty Lee's lips are so warm, and they are so alive right now. Their hearts are beating as one, and neither of them wants to release the intense fire shared between them.

This world is murky, cold, burned and dreadful. But in it, they are alive together.

Princess Azula _would_ burn the world down in order to be alive with Ty Lee.

Azula refuses to let the kiss break until she stops thinking about how much she does not want to wake up from this.


	10. Jetties

**Hypnagogia Part II: J** etties

* * *

Azula does not know how far she is willing to go to rescue Ty Lee and salvage her family.

But it is certainly far enough to delve deeper and deeper into this dark perversion of the real world. She cannot help but wonder against her will if perhaps Ty Lee is right, and that Azula is the comatose one, and that Azula is the one whose life is in danger.

Yet, Azula has not seen any evidence of that with her own two eyes. While the world might not always be _real_ to Azula, given the hallucinations that come and go like sudden rainfall in the spring, she cannot comprehend the idea that all of her time at Ty Lee's bedside was merely an illusion.

"What were those things?" Ty Lee whispers, her eyes wide. She seems more rattled than Azula has ever seen her before in their lives. "They were awful. They were awful. Please hold me."

Her voice is too breathy, but Azula chalks it up to the fact that they have been separated for so long. This world may be dark and twisted, but they are in it together and nothing is as beautiful as that fact. Azula wants to savor every second even if it means slashing up her old life and letting it bleed out.

"I don't know. But they weren't alive," Azula replies as her wife latches onto her and clings.

The heat between them is magnificent, but Azula does feel it becoming colder and colder, like the rush of blood as it pulses against skin and then drains from her body. Ty Lee is a part of her, like that blood, and Azula loves her as much as her own very life essence.

Therefore, Azula does not give a fuck how many screaming feminine zombies she has to slay. Because no one is going to help her save Ty Lee but herself. And there is a huge chance that their daughter, their only child, their _beloved_ child is trapped somewhere here.

"Yeah," Ty Lee whispers as she continues to drag Azula forward.

They continue their march through the mist without hesitation.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee catches her breath when she stops at the edge of a stream of dark water. It is blackened and ashen looking, just like everything else in this nightmare she and Azula are trapped in. Ty Lee looks down at it and then glances around for a bridge, for any bridge.

"There's a way across, right? I can see the palace from here," Azula says quietly and Ty Lee purses her dry, cracked lips.

She does not think that they should go to the palace; there cannot be anything good waiting there for she and Azula. It looks even more macabre than it does in the real world, and Ty Lee has no clue why Azula seems so preoccupied with getting to it.

Perhaps because it is the only familiar feature here, but that just makes it more chilling and disturbing to Ty Lee. The acrobat shivers for a moment before feeling much, much too warm. She squints around at the sky, desperately seeking the sun, a firestorm or some other source of the agonizing heat that is engulfing her body as Azula studies the shore in search of a way across the river.

At first it is just mildly uncomfortable, like realizing she has stayed out in the summer sun for much too long. But now her chest is tightening as it becomes as unbearable as being held against her will in excruciatingly hot water.

"Azula!" is the first thing that Ty Lee screams, because there is no other word that comes to her lips. "Azula, do you feel this?"

Azula's head snaps up from her careful survey and she stares at Ty Lee as if she is in insane.

"I don't feel anything. It's cold, though. It's way too cold here and it's getting colder," Azula says smoothly and Ty Lee attempts to laugh, but she thinks her lungs might be scalding away.

"You're-you're kidding, right?" Ty Lee stammers as she walks towards Azula. The pressure of the air against her face just feels like smoke billowing out of a volcano and making her sweat even more.

"I don't..." Azula squints and Ty Lee can see that she does have no idea. That Azula is shivering very slightly and when Ty Lee looks more closely, her wife's lips are an uncomfortably unnerving shade of blue.

"I'm sweating. I'm burning, actually, I think I might be burning alive and..." Ty Lee presses her hands against her stomach and starts rolling up her shirt to remove it.

Azula watches, noticing how much colder the nighttime feels. She assumed her frigid chill was because those dark, opaque clouds had blocked out whatever type of sun this unconscious world boasts. But Ty Lee is sweating; she is sweating _beads_ as she looks hungrily at the water.

"Don't go in there," Azula snaps, her voice echoing through the seemingly deserted ledge.

"I'm not," Ty Lee squeaks, even though she wants nothing more than to douse herself in any water, no matter how black and deadly it looks.

"You're hot because it wants you to go into the water!" Azula snarls viciously as she walks towards Ty Lee to forcibly restrain her if she has to. It seems incredibly foreboding the more she thinks about it. Particularly since her teeth are chattering ever so slightly as her face gradually blanches.

"What? What wants me to go into the water?" Ty Lee shrieks, her eyes widening as she truly contemplates doing it no matter what Azula says.

The contemplation becomes unbearable urge and need, and she walks past Azula as quickly as her legs can carry her. Azula lunges forward and her hands slip from Ty Lee's skin; it is much too slick with sweat. But Azula pushes off of the ashy bank with one foot and grabs Ty Lee by the arm as hard as she can.

Ty Lee takes a shallow, frightened breath and looks up at her bride. "I'm burning." Ty Lee hesitates as Azula digs her fingers into Ty Lee's arm, refusing to let her dive into what looks like certain and absolute death.

"You're going to look for a way across with me. The fog is freezing anyway," Azula says quietly as she looks at the frigid mist that is pressing against her, engulfing her in a glacier. "You are _not_ going to leave my sight or disobey my orders until we are in safety."

Ty Lee clenches her jaw and for a moment forgets the volcanic heat tearing at her skin.

"You do not tell me what to do. You _do not_ order me around. I will do whatever I _want to do_ because _you are not in charge of me_!" Ty Lee shrieks with an irrational anger that she thinks must stem from the fire in her veins.

Azula tugs on her and then her breath catches when she sees the overly dark purple marks spreading across Ty Lee's smooth, tan skin. The bruises increase and Azula pulls her hand away as quickly as she can, watching Ty Lee look at her with a puzzled expression as her arm begins to become the shade of the water.

"Do you not see that?" Azula whispers and Ty Lee shakes her head. "Does it hurt?"

Ty Lee shakes her head again, her lips ajar. She has no idea what Azula is talking about, but she does not doubt that her wife is seeing something that Ty Lee cannot. Because while they may be in this world together, it is most certainly not a shared dream and Ty Lee realizes that more and more every second they spend in this abysmal prison.

"Azula, please help me find a way across. I'm fine." Ty Lee extends a hand and Azula recoils from it, still staring. Still staring as Ty Lee pulls back her braid to try to relieve herself from the sweat that seems to be trying to drown her.

Before Azula can protest, that familiar, nauseating screaming echoes behind them. They argued too loudly. They woke those awful things again, and Azula can see them emerging from the grey mist out of the corner of her eye.

"Just go in the water," Azula hisses, unable to find any other option. Her thoughts feel as frozen as her body, and she does not care anymore. "Just go."

Ty Lee does not have to be told twice as she runs to the water and dives into it without any concern about her likely death from touching it. It cools her, relieving the horrid searing sensation. She closes her eyes for a moment as the heat fades away, but she opens them as soon as she feels Azula beside her, swimming as quickly as she can in the opposite direction of the banks.

It should lead to the other side.

Should. Presumably. Ty Lee does not care because she can hear the howls of the dead and violent intensifying behind her.

Azula embraces the warmth of the water, although she feels a discomfort within her about the fact that it must be torture to Ty Lee. For some reason Ty Lee is burning up bright red from fever while Azula can see her skin becoming ruddy from frostbite.

The water seems endless. Endless. Endless.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

"Ty Lee," whispers a frantic voice and Ty Lee tries to force her eyes open. She cannot have left the dream world, not with Azula probably about to drown. Ty Lee is a stronger swimmer than her despite Azula's overconfidence in absolutely everything she does. "Ty Lee please drink this. Please."

Slowly, Ty Lee recognizes that muffled voice. Her... grandmother? Agni, she has not seen her grandmother in...

Well, time does not seem very clear to Ty Lee right now as her mind becomes hazier and hazier. But her eyes do open as her grandmother pleads more about _drinking something_. She realizes that she is sinking under water.

 _She is sinking under water_ and she begins to kick her legs in utter panic. But they feel so heavy; they _want_ to drag her down in these disgustingly murky depths.

A hand grabs her wrist and Ty Lee feels the familiar, painful nails digging into her as she glides, drifting through the water away from the strange voice that feels ripped out of her childhood.

Ty Lee gasps for breath when her back hits the muddy ground, but she does not feel as if she _needed_ to breathe. Because it is a dream, she reminds herself. How many dreams has she had in which she was swimming on Ember Island and could breathe under water without it being strange at all?

"Did you hear that?" Azula asks as she sits up on her knees and tries to pull her tangled hair out of her face.

"Hear what?" Ty Lee mumbles, rubbing her sore eyes. She still cannot quite see what her surroundings are, but it doesn't matter to her much in the long run.

"My brother. He was screaming at me before I realized I was _drowning_. Probably wanted me to drown." She laughs mirthlessly as she stands up.

"He wouldn't. You two get along so good," Ty Lee murmurs as she brushes Azula's hand away and pushes herself up. It makes her wife grind her teeth for a moment in the frustration of being rejected, but Ty Lee cannot care about tiny things like that right now.

"We don't want to kill each other anymore. There is a significant difference," Azula purrs before climbing up the tiny, crumbling cliff that blocks the two of them from the other side of the river. "Are you okay from the heat?"

"The water was cold." Ty Lee hesitates. "The water was cold for me."

Azula looks at her and nods, not protesting the fact that they both are experiencing intensely different sensations while here. Their fears were so different, after all. Their prisons were so different. This world is not to be trusted for an instant.

"It's closer," Azula whispers, sighing in relief. She had the creeping fear that perhaps this world was so untrustworthy that going _towards_ the palace would bring her further away from it. "Mizuki is there and I know it."

"Mizuki probably isn't even here," Ty Lee admits. "And the palace doesn't look that inviting. Do you even see all those... thorns, or stakes, or _something_ that's trying to keep people out."

"I do. That's exactly why I'm certain that our goal is there. This world is tailored for _us_. We are the only people here. Therefore, the only people the palace is trying to keep out are _us_. Therefore, those sharp blockades are trying to keep us from getting Mizuki back. You _heard_ her screaming," Azula states and Ty Lee rolls her eyes before regretting it.

Ty Lee wishes she were not feeling annoyed with Azula, because Azula is lying on a bed, comatose, dying and Ty Lee cannot let that happen.

"If we're going to die," Ty Lee says quietly without thinking first, "I just really want to enjoy this time with you, okay?"

Azula looks at her, but before they can share the sweet moment Ty Lee was imagining, she averts her eyes and starts walking through the mist in the direction of the palace.

Ty Lee stares after her for a moment, her arms crossed over her soaking body, and then runs to catch up with her wife.

She knows Azula doesn't mean it. Azula never means it.

Azula just doesn't know how to express her love well.

And Azula isn't going to change; Ty Lee regrets trying to change her now that Azula is slipping away and might be gone any moment.

It isn't worth it.


	11. Killer

**Hypnagogia Part III: K** iller

Ty Lee and Azula reach the castle after a surprisingly easy walk. No beasts chased them, nothing strange happened; they just walked along a crumbling gray road. Their daughter's cries guided them to their destination.

When they enter, they exchange a glance.

"We split up to find her," Azula orders.

Ty Lee nods and parts ways with her beautiful wife.

As she walks through a flawless replica of the Fire Nation Royal Palace, she stumbles on a… a snare. She hits the floor.

Something screams, and then Ty Lee feels claws dig into her neck. She gasps and fights, but hits the ground. Shadow consumes her.

When she opens her eyes again, someone holds a hand out to her.

"Ty Lee, get up. You're not the one stuck asleep," says Mai. Ty Lee takes her hand and is briefly caught up in how her nails are black when they have been natural for so many years. It confuses her, but her surroundings were more confusing.

She stands at the base of the same tower. At the top, at the top must be her daughter. She needs to go get her.

"What's happening?" Ty Lee groggily asks.

"You have to fight the dragon."

"The _what_?"

"Did you hit your head and get amnesia? The dragon." She sounds exasperated and tired, as she always seems to be. "You have to go save that princess or whatever. I mean, I think it's pointless and she can save her damn self, but, you know how it works."

"No-no, Mai, Mai, I _don't_ know how it works. What dragon?" Ty Lee has never been more confused and terrified. She has the image of Azula cold on a bed, like a pyre, and herself lingering endlessly there. Is that what has become of Azula in this deep dream?

Ty Lee realizes it as she gazes at the tower; the thing about dreams is that they are not real. You always wake up. Ty Lee will be without her, unless, unless, unless…

No, that's insane.

There is no way she can save her princess in a dream. This must be wish fulfillment or the death rattle of their perfect love.

"The path is through the orchard," Mai says, pointing halfheartedly.

Ty Lee takes a deep breath. She knows that Mai is not going to explain this _dragon_ nonsense. She just walks beneath the trees of apples that shine like rubies, even in the shadows. The leaves are gold and the russet bark crumbles on every single tree.

She walks uninterrupted. It feels eerily familiar, but she is free of the orchard before she can figure it out. Now she stands somewhere strange. The sun has risen at last and Ty Lee looks up at the blood red sky.

Its orange rays glimmer in front of Ty Lee. She skirts around them; these sunbeams do not look appealing.

The road to the tower is no different from the road she and Azula followed to the castle. Yet, she can smell beaches and bonfires. Nothing around her seemed to explain the scent. Maybe she is imagining it.

Can someone truly smell in a dream?

Is this a dream?

Is Ty Lee ever going to wake?

She tries to forget those harsh questions and walks down the middle of the path. The dirt is blackened, but as she nears the tower, she begins to see white ash covering the road. Ty Lee looks up at the foreboding obsidian tower. Ty Lee _really_ hopes that a dragon will not show up out of nowhere. She would like to avoid that, to be honest.

Ty Lee reaches towards the smooth tower and succeeds only at cutting her hand. She cannot see a way to climb it. As she paces, the heat from the strange orange sun disappears, leaving her shivering.

She looks up and sees a hazy figure of a dragon. It does not even seem real. Nothing in this place does, however.

"Where is she?" Ty Lee asks, as if dragons can speak. She assumes it guards Azula, since Ty Lee is to fight it. "Where is she?"

Of course it does not respond. Why would it answer her?

Ty Lee steps back when the beast shudders, its wings shaking. She could see that its temperance has fled. It is prepared to fight her.

Well, now Ty Lee is supposed to kill a dragon. That should be easy, right?

Ty Lee steps back and dances away from the white flames. She has no intention of landing a punch. Maybes she can wear it out and then escape. Ty Lee does not think she is remotely capable of killing a dragon.

As she dodges the thousandth attack, she trips and the flowers wrap around her ankle. She falls on her feet and barely rolls away from the fangs that descend on her. It smells like rotting seaweed, but there is no ocean in sight.

Ty Lee reaches to the flowers and sees that they have transformed into platinum chains.

Again, Ty Lee avoids the dragon, but she nearly rips her leg off in the process.

It is not a bright idea; she does not do it intentionally. By some dumb luck, the dragon's next attack breaks the chains and Ty Lee jumps up, pushing off of the tower. It scrapes her hands, but she feels no pain.

Ty Lee runs up the wall and falls down, a kick pointed directly at the dragon's eyes. It could open its maw so easily and devour her, but it brushes her away. She falls against the ground and gasps for breath.

It can go in for the kill now. Hopefully, Ty Lee will wake. Please let her wake when it kills her.

She remembers her childhood cat as she tries to crawl away. Ty Lee was not supposed to keep pets, but she took care of it for years until it disappeared. One day, as it ran around her legs, she stepped on its paw and it let out a horrific screeching sound. Ty Lee felt such remorse that she chased it through her family's garden.

When Ty Lee reached it, it tried to fight her. She still had a scar from that kitty trying to kill her. But Ty Lee reached out and spoke in a calm, gentle voice and held out a hand for it to sniff. It returned to her lap.

At the last minute, Ty Lee reaches forward and towards the creature.

It stares at her without any evil in its eyes. When Ty Lee's hand rests on its snout, she feels how corporeal the ghost is. She trembles. Her body hurts. The ground is so _hot_ around her but her skin is so _cold_.

"I'm sorry I scared you," Ty Lee says in a soft voice she has used a few times. On that cat, on other creatures… most notably on Azula. "I don't want to kill you. Please don't hurt me."

The plea would sound pathetic to anyone, but the dragon shudders again, this time lying down in front of her. Ty Lee does not move off of her back; she cannot afford to scare it at this point.

She cautiously watches the dragon and sees it slowly fade. It blows away in the wind. Ty Lee sees that it was made of the ashes that coat the land around the tower.

In its place, in a blanket of ash, a princess lies sleeping, held frozen by some infuriating curse. Ty Lee stands and limps towards her princess, wiping sweat from her skin. She still feels damp, no matter what she does. She walks towards the bed of ash, the bed that looks so comfortable. It is more of a sand dune than anything else.

Her fight was _so_ hard. She sits down close to the soft ash. Ty Lee needs to catch her breath. Azula can wait, can't she? She _is_ asleep.

It is _so hot_ now that the dragon vanished and Ty Lee feels like she has been hit by a tranquilizer dart. She lies down beside the princess she was told she was to save and closes her eyes.

"Ty Lee, Ty Lee, Ty Lee."

She feels nails jabbing into her back.

"Ouch! Stop it! I just fought a freaking dragon, you can't expect me to—" _be here_. Ty Lee looks up at the room around her. The fog and fuzziness have been replaced by clarity.

Ty Lee is no longer dreaming, and she is no longer with the woman she lay down beside like a fool.

"You definitely didn't fight a dragon," Mai says, crossing her arms. "You did sleep for an entire day, which just can't be healthy. We can't have both of you like that."

"Both of…" Ty Lee was just at her side.

In her dream, she believed that her princess could wait.

In her life, she knows that that is far from the truth.

She wonders, nauseated, if not kissing Azula had condemned the princess to eternal slumber, eventual starvation, and inevitably slipping away.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula walks through the replica of her childhood home. She can hear her little girl's cries slow to a stop. It makes her walk faster; she refuses to lose her daughter along with her wife.

She brushes against a wall and the stone latches around her. Azula lashes out with her fire, and loses consciousness in the flash of blue light.

When she wakes, Azula wears a gown of white silk. She has never seen anything as pure as it before. Not a single stain or flaw in the cascading fabric.

When she lifts her eyes from the new clothes, she sees the fire burning. White fire radiating from a white ivory throne. The floor, the floor is blindingly white as well, and the ceiling, and the walls.

She walks towards the throne, because it is the only logical place to go.

 _"Strike her down and accept your crown…"_ whisper the walls.

Azula does not see who they are talking about. Her eyes dart away from the throne, and when they return she sees the small frame of a beautiful woman asleep on the throne, which Azula now realizes is quite oversized. Was it always like that?

 _"Strike her down and accept your crown…"_ whisper the walls.

Princess Azula walks towards Ty Lee. She is here to rescue her, right? She followed their daughter's screams, but if she can wake Ty Lee in this eerie throne room, she might wake in the real world. The real world… it feels like it never existed. She could not be further away from her home.

 _"Kill her, killer…"_

Azula reaches forward to wake Ty Lee, but she feels the sparks in her, like someone has shocked her.

The minute her hand touches Ty Lee, she watches herself kill her.

Azula always was a killer.

She looks around for the exit. This is a nightmare, and she always wakes from nightmares. She has for the entirety of her tormented her life.

But she just stands there, alone in this white throne room, in utter silence.

There is no way out.


	12. Loss

**Night Seven: L** oss

* * *

Ty Lee struggles to adjust to reality, or what she thinks is reality.

She barely can see the world around her as Mai takes her by the arm and tries to guide her to food. She wants to ask how long she has been asleep, but she cannot remember how words work. Her head hurts and the walls spin.

All she wants is to go back to sleep, but she is too scared of what she will find there.

The truth is, she is too scared to confront what she lost. She may have been lost in some weird nightmare, but she was there with a woman who was slowly drawing her last breaths. Why would Ty Lee ever want to leave, even if she had to kill a thousand dragons?

"What's going on?" Ty Lee slurs. Mai releases her and she realizes she is sitting in a chair at the main dining room table. She can see and smell food, but it just makes her sick.

"You've been out for an entire day and night. I'm glad you woke up," Mai says and Ty Lee wants to punch her for some reason. She does not sound _miserable_ enough about losing Azula. "Eat something. Drink something too. Probably drink something first. Here's some tea."

Ty Lee almost does not see the teacup when her sister-in-law sets it down in front of her. She touches it to see how hot it is, and then takes a sip, and then drains the cup.

"Water?" she asks, confused about how to make full sentences. She thinks she has forgotten that skill.

"Fine," Mai says. She sighs when she hands Ty Lee a cup of water. Quickly, she decides to offer the entire pitcher, because that cup is gone in a split second.

"Okay," Ty Lee says after she finishes off the whole pitcher. "Okay, tell me what's happening with everything and everyone and…?"

The world has come into further focus, but that does not help Ty Lee in the slightest. She still feels foggy and overwhelmed.

"Azula still isn't better. Your daughter is neglected and worried about you," Mai says and Ty Lee frowns. She tries not to burst into tears, but fails. "Stop crying. Stop. Stop crying. Okay, fine, keep crying. We're going to figure this out, but I think you need to accept the possibility that you'll lose her. I've been spending way too long telling you that you can't die too."

"I think my dreams are real," Ty Lee says.

"I think you're distraught and not thinking straight," Mai replies without giving Ty Lee's idea an ounce of her attention. She does not even _try_ to consider that possibility and it enrages Ty Lee. "Please get up and comfort your child. She matters more than anything else."

Ty Lee grabs a small cake and goes to try to find Mizuki. She falls into the wall and smashes her head before the Fire Lady sighs and helps her to the courtyard.

The sun blinds Ty Lee as she walks into it, but she perks up when she hears her daughter's voice.

Mizuki needs her.

But Azula needs her too.

Ty Lee cannot lose either one of them.

She just can't.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

"I believe you about your dreams," Katara says, making Ty Lee jump.

Ty Lee had no idea that the waterbender was still here. Then again, she still is not quite sure where _here_ is. It feels like home in the Fire Nation, but she does not know if she will ever be sure.

She is sitting outside with Mizuki, whom has just run off, and now stares aimlessly at the sky.

"Why?" Ty Lee asks, turning around. Katara makes an odd face. "Why?"

"Because I do. I think you can probably find someone to help you," Katara says, walking into the light. She looks weary, and Ty Lee regrets thinking she did not want to save Azula. Maybe she does, but nobody wants it like Ty Lee does. "I can help you, but you have to leave her."

"No. No!" Ty Lee jumps onto her feet. " _No_!"

"But you might be able to save her if you do. You don't have to do anything about it, but you're not helping her by grieving before she's even dead," Katara says and Ty Lee feels livid.

She does, however, realize how much she needs the bluntness.

Ty Lee asks, "What do I have to do?"


	13. Mother

**Night Eight: M** other

* * *

Ty Lee goes to Katara.

"Will you go with me to this mystic I know?" Ty Lee inquires and Katara hesitantly nods. "I know you've been warning me, but I just want to have a better control over the dreams. I want to explore them and understand them enough to be able to break free of them and live a life with Mizuki. AND AZULA. Azula will be in my life too! She's going to get better!"

Katara recoils at the yelling, but composes herself. "We can go."

The two women walk through Caldera. Ty Lee embraces the mystic in the shop that smells so strongly of clashing perfumes Katara thinks she might pass out. Ty Lee steps back and engages in a hurried conversation with the mystic, covering her dreams and her experience in hypnogogia.

"You two will not let go. Your love has endured so much, you have been through so much with your struggles and her madness. Your spirits will not be broken apart so easily. I believe it is a gift to you from the Spirit World but you must not abuse it," eerily says the mystic. "I will give you a concoction that will send you elsewhere. I can connect the bodies of both of you, even in her sleep, and perhaps then, there will be more than the spirits."

"Connect both of us?"

"You would see the inside of her mind."

"I don't know if that's a place I'd like to be. It's scary in there."

"Your dreamworld sounds scary as well. Trust when I say you must link bodies to prove that this is the case. If you sleep beside her after the potion and wake without entering her mind, then the dreams mean nothing and are just vivid wishful thinking. Prove to yourself whether they have meaning or not."

The mystic grabs many of the herbs and ingredients in her shop and morphs them into simple glass bottle of a red liquid. Katara frowns. She is fine with exploring the Spirit World and she knows that Ty Lee needs to confirm her dreams, but it still bothers her that Ty Lee clings this way.

And, as soon as they get home, Ty Lee checks on Mizuki and heads right to her comatose wife. She sips the potion before Katara can even get through the doorway, and the sedative in it slowly knocks her out.

She opens her eyes and sees a cloudless, bright blue sky. It stings her eyes to even look at it, and she wonders if she can be in a dream and feel pain. Maybe it is too real for her own good; maybe she has made a terrible mistake. No, no she has not. She will do anything to rescue her love.

Slowly, Ty Lee sits up and looks around. She is in a field of flowers. They all are a very unnatural hue of blue. Everything about this place seems slightly _off_. It does not feel the same way that her other dreams did, but she still has the feeling of being somewhere she does not belong.

Ty Lee stands and wonders where she should go. This field seems to stretch on forever. Suddenly, she sees a path. She is not sure if it was there a moment ago or not, but she starts walking on it.

Azula must be around here somewhere.

It _is_ Azula's own mind.

Her mind seems very pleasant so far, which has taken Ty Lee by surprise. Azula really does not seem like the kind of a person to have a subconscious of sunny skies and tranquil meadows.

Ty Lee has the sneaking suspicion that she will get to the frightening part eventually, if not very soon. She then realizes that she might not have an infinite amount of time here. What if she wakes up? What if she wakes up right before she finds her wife? What if she _never_ wakes up and dies here?

What if she is the half-dead one, and this is all an elaborate and lonely dream of hers.

Ty Lee reaches a cliff and barely avoids falling off of it. She cannot get caught up in her anxious thoughts when she is somewhere so perilous.

She looks up and stares at the sky again.

It is not cloudless. It is not the bright blue of an Ember Island summer.

It is on fire.

Ty Lee looks over her shoulder and sees that the meadow is gone.

Now things are getting less pretty. She had hoped that the beauty would have lasted a little longer, but she needs to focus on her goal.

Ty Lee walks along the edge of the cliff and finds a rope bridge leading across it. She bolts onto the thing without even testing its stability. The fact that she reaches the other side without plummeting into the ocean below stuns her.

That is not ocean, she realizes. That is fire too.

Ty Lee is surrounded on all six sides by flames. That was to be expected, however, and she tries to focus on how fire is not dangerous. How this dream is safer than the real world. How this dream makes more sense than the real world.

She starts walking and finds herself crossing desert. The sand is bright red, then dark red, then exactly the shade of blood. Ty Lee sees trees begin to jut up. They burn and smoke billows around them.

Ty Lee can feel the heat. It unnerves her.

She hears something and freezes. Footsteps. She thinks she just heard footsteps.

Ty Lee starts looking for where she heard the sound and sees someone with dark, unforgettable hair and a more unforgettable body walking away from her, towards nothingness.

"Azula!" shouts Ty Lee, but the princess clearly does not hear her.

Ty Lee runs and runs. She watches every single slow step of Azula's as she walks away without noticing her wife.

"Azula!" cries Ty Lee again.

She trips over an unseen obstacle and falls onto her hands and knees.

When she looks up, Azula is gone as if she vanished into thin air.

Of course it is not that easy.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee wakes up in the middle of the night to someone shaking her. She tries to drift off again, but the prodding becomes more insistent. She at last looks up and lays eyes on Mai. Everything looks fuzzy in the dark.

"We have a problem," Mai says and Ty Lee squints. "Not really a problem. Maybe. There's just…"

"What?" Ty Lee asks softly, sitting up. Mai does not look good. Ty Lee's heart races. She knows what her old best friend is about to say. "She's dead, isn't she?"

Saying _dead_ makes Ty Lee's skin crawl. She cannot believe she let that awful word leave her lips.

"No. No, but she's still close to that, but…" Mai seems to search for what to say. "Her mother is here, and I think you should talk to her. And probably talk to your own child about the fact that you've been asleep for over a day instead of comforting her."

"Over a day?" Ty Lee inquires. She is not sure what of Mai's statements she disliked more, but right now she feels hung up on one part.

Her child cannot become an orphan.

Ty Lee feels sick.


	14. Nurturing

**Night Seven: L** oss

* * *

Ty Lee struggles to adjust to reality, or what she thinks is reality.

She barely can see the world around her as Mai takes her by the arm and tries to guide her to food. She wants to ask how long she has been asleep, but she cannot remember how words work. Her head hurts and the walls spin.

All she wants is to go back to sleep, but she is too scared of what she will find there.

The truth is, she is too scared to confront what she lost. She may have been lost in some weird nightmare, but she was there with a woman who was slowly drawing her last breaths. Why would Ty Lee ever want to leave, even if she had to kill a thousand dragons?

"What's going on?" Ty Lee slurs. Mai releases her and she realizes she is sitting in a chair at the main dining room table. She can see and smell food, but it just makes her sick.

"You've been out for an entire day and night. I'm glad you woke up," Mai says and Ty Lee wants to punch her for some reason. She does not sound _miserable_ enough about losing Azula. "Eat something. Drink something too. Probably drink something first. Here's some tea."

Ty Lee almost does not see the teacup when her sister-in-law sets it down in front of her. She touches it to see how hot it is, and then takes a sip, and then drains the cup.

"Water?" she asks, confused about how to make full sentences. She thinks she has forgotten that skill.

"Fine," Mai says. She sighs when she hands Ty Lee a cup of water. Quickly, she decides to offer the entire pitcher, because that cup is gone in a split second.

"Okay," Ty Lee says after she finishes off the whole pitcher. "Okay, tell me what's happening with everything and everyone and…?"

The world has come into further focus, but that does not help Ty Lee in the slightest. She still feels foggy and overwhelmed.

"Azula still isn't better. Your daughter is neglected and worried about you," Mai says and Ty Lee frowns. She tries not to burst into tears, but fails. "Stop crying. Stop. Stop crying. Okay, fine, keep crying. We're going to figure this out, but I think you need to accept the possibility that you'll lose her. I've been spending way too long telling you that you can't die too."

"I think my dreams are real," Ty Lee says.

"I think you're distraught and not thinking straight," Mai replies without giving Ty Lee's idea an ounce of her attention. She does not even _try_ to consider that possibility and it enrages Ty Lee. "Please get up and comfort your child. She matters more than anything else."

Ty Lee grabs a small cake and goes to try to find Mizuki. She falls into the wall and smashes her head before the Fire Lady sighs and helps her to the courtyard.

The sun blinds Ty Lee as she walks into it, but she perks up when she hears her daughter's voice.

Mizuki needs her.

But Azula needs her too.

Ty Lee cannot lose either one of them.

She just can't.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Katara's voice entering Ty Lee's chambers makes her jump. "I believe you about your dreams. At least, I believe that they are very powerful, and maybe involve the communion of your spirits. I don't believe your dreams can save her. I'm a healer and I don't know if there is much hope left. But I believe you about your dreams."

Ty Lee had no idea that the waterbender was still here. Then again, she still is not quite sure where _here_ is. It feels like home in the Fire Nation, but she does not know if she will ever be sure.

She was moments ago with Mizuki, whom has just run off, and now stares aimlessly at the crimson wall in her new bedroom.

"Why?" Ty Lee asks, turning around. Katara makes an odd face. "Why do you even care?"

"Because I do. I understand how much you love her. I hope you know that all of your friends and everyone else is here for you no matter what, but you can't waste your whole life dreaming. You'd lose too much." Katara says, walking into the light. She looks weary, and Ty Lee regrets thinking she did not want to save Azula. Maybe she does, but nobody wants it like Ty Lee does. "You need to find out how to leave her when you need to."

"No. No!" Ty Lee jumps onto her feet. " _No_!"

"But you have to see how much the _real world_ matters. You were knocked out and we were all worried for you. Your grief is complicated, I know, but please, if you want the dreams, want to live in them, remember to live in this world with your friends and baby girl too," Katara says and Ty Lee feels livid.

She does, however, realize how much she needs the bluntness.

Ty Lee whispers, "Maybe you're right."

She does not want to give a more definite answer.


	15. Opposition

**Night Ten: O** pposition

* * *

Ty Lee again enlists the help of Katara, but before she can begin the process, Mai interrupts her.

"You can't do this. Just let it be."

"Stop telling me that!"

"No, I won't stop telling you that until you finally listen. I'm going to intervene every step of the way until you come to your senses," Mai orders, but Ty Lee shakes her head.

"Katara is helping me and you should leave me alone now," Ty Lee snaps, nearly growling.

Mai backs off, knowing she will do it again tomorrow, and the next day, and the next, until Ty Lee decides to live her own life and let the Universe do as it wills with Azula.

When Ty Lee arrives back at the strange world, she does not have to walk far before she finds her wife. That baffles her; she thought she would spend a lifetime looking, but, right now, she has taken a few steps into the meadow and sees Azula lying there.

Ty Lee runs to her, wondering if she is dead, hoping she is not dead, and gets her answer when Azula sits up. Swiftly as the wind, Ty Lee sits down beside her.

"Azula," she whispers. "Azula, don't die. Azula, how do I save you? How—?"

Ty Lee cannot finish her sentence, because Azula kisses her. Azula strokes her bare arm and she takes in a deep breath. This world does not smell like anything, but Ty Lee does not linger on that observation for too long. She barely remembers what this feels like, but she knows what she wants to do; Ty Lee straddles her and leans in as close to her as possible for the first kiss.

Hesitantly, afraid to burst this bubble of a perfect moment, reaches her hand down, slowly, slowly, slowly. Azula lies back on the grass. It nearly covers her. When did they become naked? When did that happen? Ty Lee almost remembers this is a dream, but forces it out of her mind as fast as she can.

The tips of Ty Lee's fingers slide to a sensation that could not possibly feel fake. Warm and real and not perfect but perfect and Azula's shiver prompts her to continue forgetting. Azula's back arching leaves her breathless.

Ty Lee leans down and kisses Azula on the lips. She leans into the motion as hard as she can. The fire burning every inch of her lets her lose herself in this eerily silent meadow with this eerily silent woman.

Azula, as if sensing Ty Lee's fears, turns over and Ty Lee thinks about how she cannot feel the blades of grass on her back. She might as well be drifting through the air.

"This is just a dream, isn't it? Just a dream…" Ty Lee does not think she is in Azula's head like she was before. This is her head, her dream, her fantasy.

"So?" Azula asks, sounding so much like herself. But she is not.

"I just hope I don't wake up," Ty Lee whispers.

Azula definitely is just Ty Lee's own mirage, because the real one would be livid that Ty Lee suggests such a thing.

The fake Azula sucks hard on one of her nipples and Ty Lee cries out, at last forgetting, when the dream girl takes it in her teeth.

It ends so abruptly. Ty Lee wakes up. It ends so abruptly, before Ty Lee can even try to save Azula, or savor those last moments, or anything she set out to do today. She is beginning to think that she will never be able to save her wife and she is scared to death.

She would die without Azula. This dream proves that, does it not? It does, it does.

Ty Lee looks at the room around her and starts to cry.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula is on her fourth cup of black tea tonight. Mai sits and stares at her, confused by it.

"Do _not_ let me fall asleep. Do not _dare_ let me fall asleep," snarls the princess, her words tumbling into each other from the excess of caffeine and lack of food or water or anything else vital for human life. "If I don't fall asleep, I can never be tempted."

"That seems like a solution with a short shelf life."

"It is better than _no_ solution, Mai!" Azula stands up and shouts. "MIZUKI!"

After a few moments, a sleepy tiny princess walks into the room. She clutches her favorite blanket, the one she never lets any of the servants wash unless Ty Lee tricks her into it. Azula does not get how her wife did that, so the blanket is very disgusting.

Azula thinks about how she cannot parent. Then she thinks about how she _needs_ to learn to do these things in Ty Lee's absence. She cannot continue succumbing to her weakness. Azula _must_ oppose the part of her begging to cling to her wife.

"Mother?" Mizuki chirps, blinking her eyes many times and then staring up at Azula.

"We are going to stay up all night," Azula announces. She flashes a glare at Mai when the Fire Lady groans. "It will be very fun."

Mizuki looks puzzled, but then looks excited.

Azula could not be more grateful.

She spends the entire night awake playing with her daughter, or, at least, playing with her to the best of her ability. Azula thinks she is doing a good job until Mizuki falls off of the bed she was jumping on and begins to shriek and cry.

Azula sits down in front of her and tries to figure out what to do.

"How are you injured?" Azula asks, and Mizuki just keeps crying. "Do you need a bandage?" The kid keeps on crying. Azula certainly never did this to her father. "I can get you some water."

Mizuki keeps crying.

Azula tries a few more offers before she just screams, "Be a brat then!"

She gets up and begrudgingly asks Mai for help. The Fire Lady hates her sleep being interrupted, but she goes and consoles the child. The minute Mai hugs her—a weird sight—Mizuki stops crying.

Azula squints; there must be some trick involved.

"Have you ever hugged your child?" Mai asks, truly wanting to know.

"Of course not. It makes them grow up weak."

Princess Azula does not understand why Mai sighs at that fact of life.


	16. Practice

**Night Eleven: P** ractice

* * *

In the morning, Azula fights with Mizuki. She loses her temper at a small child and she knows Ty Lee would not have done that. Now Mizuki is crying and she is trying to find the right words.

All she feels as anger, and she does not think that is the proper emotion for this situation.

"I'm not good at the mommy thing," says Princess Azula, staring at her daughter. Mizuki sniffles. "You should know that."

Mizuki is not offended, as most would be. She knows her mother to an extent, and she hugs her mother's legs.

"You just need practice. Anybody can do anything with practice." Mizuki squeezes her eyes shut and smiles. "So, practice with me! You can be my mommy with me!"

Mizuki is excited, thrilled by the prospect of Azula playing a real role in her life. Azula thinks she might have more hope than Ursa ever would, because a young Azula would not have even wanted her mother to try. It consoles her slightly after their morning altercation.

"Sure," Azula says, although it sounds dreadful.

She loves her daughter, but she would not be able to love her daughter were it not for the woman who is probably going to die. Azula does not know how she is going to practice skills she will never learn.

Azula gives up when she is not perfect at things.

And she will never be the perfect mother.

Not without another one to help her.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

"You've lived without her before," Mai says, trying to talk to an inconsolable Ty Lee. "You need to stop being a prisoner to this, okay? You…"

She does not know. Mai does not know, and she wishes she did not start this conversation.

" _Terribly_. It was horrible." Ty Lee touches her knees to her lips and wraps her arms around her legs. "It was so horrible."

"You developed genuine self-confidence and made other friends. I think it was really good for you." Mai notices what she said. "Not that it would be good this time. I'm just putting the period of time after the war into perspective. You love her and that's good, and your life will never be the same without her, but you can still be okay."

"I can't recover from this. Never," Ty Lee says quietly, now crying again.

Mai does not know why she thought she could be helpful.

"You have to. You'll get through days without her; it will just take some practice."

"Practice. It's not the perfect handstand. I can't _practice_ living without the love of my life," Ty Lee says, closing her eyes.

Mai takes that as a signal that the conversation is over.

"You can self-destruct. Fine. I just can't take watching you like this." Mai stands up and sighs. "But I don't know why I even try."

"I'm not moving on, and I'm going to save her," Ty Lee says.

Mai does not believe her, but she gives no indication of it.


	17. Questions

**Night Twelve: Q** uestions

* * *

Azula dies today.

Ty Lee watches her pyre burn and does not break down. That night, she lies alone in her bed and tries to sleep. She does not think she can, but, when she does, she begins to see her familiar dream world.

When she sees Azula on the horizon, her heart soars. But as they approach each other, the dream abruptly ends. Suddenly, Ty Lee snaps out of her mind and wakes, drenched in sweat. She stares up at the ceiling and believes she will cry, but she does not.

She keeps asking herself _why_. The questions never end.

But she cannot save Azula anymore, so why should she care?

Why is it that she cried and cried until Azula was gone and now she cannot shed a tear?

Has she cried them all away? Has she run out?

Or has she just lost hope?

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee dies today.

Azula lays flowers on her pyre and stands still, mute, like a gorgeous statue garbed in ash white. That night, she lies down, locked in her room and thinks she has made it without emotion. Maybe she can last. Mizuki has fallen asleep. Her duties are done.

But then the tears flow. They flow and flow and she chokes and sobs like she has not since she was young.

She closes her eyes for a moment and thinks she sees her beautiful dream world but opens them moments later without even a chance to see her wife.

Azula gazes at the ceiling and begins to sob.

She keeps trying to figure out _why_. The questions never end.

Why can Azula not stop crying?

Why can she not control herself?

Why has she lost her coldness and her strength?

Because she has lost all hope?


	18. Relationship

**Night Thirteen: R** elationship

* * *

The funeral was yesterday and the comforting words come off as platitudes. Azula is sickened by the people around her and so she confines herself to her room. She cannot sleep and so she cannot dream and cannot figure out if some part of Ty Lee remains with her.

She sits in the dark, staring at the wall, for hours.

Mai invites herself in and Azula barely stops herself from electrocuting her to death.

"I'm not great with words," sighs Mai. "I guess I'll just say what I'm actually thinking. You two had a weird relationship, but I guess you did love her."

"Has everyone always doubted that?" Azula asks, despite knowing the answer.

"Haven't you doubted it?"

 _Yes._

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee forces herself to entertain the mourners. None of them cared for Azula. _None of them_. Nobody loved Princess Azula the way Princess Ty Lee did and they never could. Not even Ozai or Zuko or anyone else.

Yet, Ty Lee loved friends and loved people and so she stayed in the open and accepted every sweet, heartfelt condolence from people she did not know the names of.

Mai approaches her, at last.

"I'm not gonna be as sweet as everybody else. I don't think you actually like that. I think you're pretending to make everybody else feel better and not yourself," says Mai.

Ty Lee sighs. "That's true."

Mai states, "You two had a weird relationship, but I think she really loved you."

"I never doubted that," Ty Lee insists vehemently, clenching her fists.

"Everyone else did."

 _I know._


	19. Selfishness

**Night Fourteen: S** elfishness

* * *

Ursa tries to assist Azula, and as she hands her a teacup says, "This will help you sleep."

"I do not need your help, mother," Azula hisses, rubbing at her eyes. They have dark circles under them, which probably is why Ursa thinks she needs help.

"You look tired, more than I've ever seen," says Ursa as she brushes a lock of hair away from Azula's face and tucks it behind her ear.

"Well, you haven't seen a lot of me, now have you?" Azula says. She grinds her teeth.

Ursa succeeds at her coercion by stating calmly and kindly, "And you'll see little of your own child if you don't rest."

Azula then recalls that she might be able to drift into a deep enough slumber to return to her dreamworld. At that, she wordlessly accepts the medicine and walks towards her bedroom. She doubles back and stares into Mizuki's room, wondering if she should tuck her in. When she sees her daughter has taken care of herself, she steps away into the shadows and walks to her bedroom.

She drinks the concoction, changes her clothes, and lies down to go to sleep.

In an instant, she passes out, her first time sleeping since her wife died.

Azula wakes in a world with purple grass and light pink skies and trees the hue of her flames. It is not the same dream world because she can see how unreal it is at only a glance. That serves as a reminder that her wife is dead. Dead. Dead. Dead.

She strides among the cerulean trees and sees her wife tearing up over melted cinnamon ice cream, smeared red on her beautiful hands.

Azula runs to her and kisses her deeply. She tastes like the ice cream and smells like herself and she could not feel more _real_.

Azula orders, unwilling to give Ty Lee another choice, "Let's stay here forever."

After a moment's pause, Ty Lee breathes, "That would be so selfish."

Azula ignores that true statement and repeats, "Let's stay here forever."

Ty Lee's expression softens and a gentle smile spreads across her face.

"Okay," she says.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

"This will help you sleep," says Ursa, handing a teacup to Ty Lee.

Ty Lee forces a smile, like she has so many times these past days. She has not done her make-up or changed her clothes since the funeral and she certainly has not slept. The bags under her eyes are certainly not cute.

But, the truth is, she does not care.

"Thank you, Azula's—" A queasy feeling reminds Ty Lee of what happened. "Thank you Ursa."

Ursa calmly insists, "I'm still her mother, even now. I always will be."

"Thank you, Azula's Mom," Ty Lee says, accepting the cup and walking down the hallway.

She stops in Mizuki's room and tenderly tucks her in. Ty Lee kisses her forehead and tucks her stuffed animal in too before she heads to her bedroom and does not bother changing before she downs the drink in one gulp.

Her head begins to spin and she falls asleep as soon as her head hits the pillow.

Ty Lee opens her eyes and gazes up through cerulean leaves at a pink sky.

She sits serenely in her lovely dream world with cinnamon ice cream in her hand. She does not have a bowl and as she ignores the food it melts between the cracks of her fingers. Before she can begin to cry, she looks up and sees Azula approaching.

Her wife pounces and kisses her. Her lips taste like sour lemonade but Ty Lee would never recoil. She still smells like herself and she looks like herself and here, she is not dead, and here she is real.

"Did you lose me?" Ty Lee asks, pulling back and taking a breath.

"Yes," says Azula, sitting down on the purple grass in front of Ty Lee.

She wears such stunning red clothes; Ty Lee is blown away by the sheer force of her beauty.

"I'm so happy to see you," Ty Lee says, tears dripping from her eyes. Azula wipes them away and it is the most romantic thing Ty Lee has ever experienced.

"Let's stay here forever," whispers Azula, locking eyes with her wife.

Ty Lee can only think of Mizuki, and Zuko, and Ursa and so many other people who would be lost without Ty Lee. "That would be so selfish."

Azula just repeats, "Let's stay here forever."

Ty Lee decides that those people can fend for themselves.

"Okay," she says.


	20. Trust

**Night Fifteen: T** rust

* * *

Azula and Ty Lee sit in the stunning dream world. The colors keep shifting and at the moment the trees are a hue of gold unseen in nature and the sky a crimson red with fluffy pink clouds.

Their lips crush against each other for the hundredth time before Ty Lee realizes something sickening that makes her blood run cold. She hates it, and she hates how it makes her pull away from her dead-alive-dead-alive wife.

"We have lives. We have lives that we need to go back to. We need to go home," Ty Lee whispers, closing her eyes.

"I think _we_ is the wrong word. Because _I_ am exactly where I need to be." Azula kisses her deeply.

Ty Lee's eyelids fly open, revealing baffled orbs. "Don't you trust that I'll come back?"

Azula replies without hesitating, "No."

Ty Lee says with all of the honesty in her soul, "Of course I will. I always will. I'd rather be here than anywhere else in the world."

"I want to call that romantic, but I think the person making the decision is whoever wakes one of us up first," says Princess Azula.

"So, whoever wakes up first has to come back," Ty Lee whispers before giving Azula kiss.

"I agree," replies Azula. "I will try to trust you."

"Why don't you?" Ty Lee asks, snagging Azula's hand and taking it in both of hers. "Why don't you trust me?"

"Because I never have."

"Because of when we were teenagers. Because of me betraying you?"

Azula corrects, "No. See, for there to be _betrayal_ there would have to be trust _first_."

"Can I make you trust me?" Ty Lee inquires, letting Azula's hand fall limp.

"Probably not."

"Not even after death?"

"I do not even trust myself. Stop worrying; it is not attractive."

Ty Lee tries her best not to be offended and rests her head on Azula's shoulder.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula wakes up first. She would have bet her royal fortune that someone would need Ty Lee before someone would need her, but she sees Mizuki above her.

The little girl pleads in her little girl voice, "Mother, mother, mother, please wake up."

Azula's eyes flutter open and then droop down again. The medicine has made her weak, but she only wants more of it. More and more and to spend an eternity in that surreal world behind her eyelids where her wife is alive.

"I'll be with you in a minute," she whispers, and slowly sits up.

Mizuki wraps her arms around her only remaining mom.


	21. Understanding

**Night Sixteen: U** nderstanding

* * *

Azula sits and stares out of the open window, watching the sun begin to dip below the horizon. This morning, she woke and she cannot remember what followed. She is not entirely sure how she ended up sitting here.

She wants to die. The only thing that keeps her living is the fact that when she goes to sleep she can live in another world, a better world.

"Mother," says a small voice from the doorway, "will you tuck me in?"

"Is it even nighttime?" Azula asks, not turning around to face the daughter she created with her now dead wife.

"It's light out 'cause it's summer but it's my bedtime," Mizuki chirps.

Azula stands up. "Fine. I will tuck you in."

Mizuki goes with Azula down the hallway until she reaches her bedroom. She clambers into her bed by herself and waits with no covers on. Azula edges inside and then pulls them up over her daughter. She is not sure what else to do.

"Tell me a story, please," Mizuki asks, eyes wide, pleading and sparkling.

"How are you okay?" Azula asks, rubbing at her own dark, baggy eyes. "Do you not understand what happened?"

 _Am I supposed to make you understand what happened? Because I don't even understand what happened,_ she thinks.

"I dunno." The pained twist of her lips answers Azula's question.

"Fine. I will tell you the story of the little Princess Sparrowkeet," says Azula, because the only person who can understand the gravity of this loss is that tiny little girl.

Mizuki listens to the story while holding back tears.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee wakes up alone after ages in solitude under a strangely colored sky, the setting sun making patterns on her exposed back.

She slowly gets out of bed and tries to find her mother-in-law, or at least someone who can make her go back to sleep immediately.

After walking a little ways down the hall, she decides she is tired and weak enough to just return. Even if Azula is not there, it is infinitely better than here.

Ty Lee goes to her bed and lies down. She half-expects someone to come tell her she is being irresponsible, or to tell her that they knew she could not live without Azula. No one does. No one cares. No one understands.

Those thoughts keep Ty Lee awake until the sky is pitch black.

She drifts off while weeping.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Azula runs through the terrarium that once terrified her. She had to look strong during all of the tests in this place, but now she truly _is_ more powerful than it. Ty Lee waits for her in a meadow of strange paper flowers that crumble under Princess Azula's touch.

"What do you want to do tonight?" Ty Lee asks sweetly, batting her eyelashes and blushing.

Azula says what she has been thinking about all day, during her periods of lucidity. "We should build a home here. A real home."

Ty Lee looks eager at first, but something wipes that expression from her face.

She asks, glancing over each shoulder uneasily, "But what about all the crazy stuff that happens in this world."

"Strange things happen in every world," Azula says curtly.

"You're so smart, my princess."

Ty Lee smiles, and they both get to work finding a proper plot of land.


	22. Venom

**Night Seventeen: V** enom

* * *

Azula wanders in the morning, in only a kimono, her hair a messy curtain around her tired face. She walks to the courtyard with her tea in hand and slowly looks around. Then, abruptly, she drops the tea and bolts through the garden, shouting a sound similar to her daughter's name.

"Mizuki!" she finally coherently called out, and when she threw a blue flame forward to slay the scorpion-serpent, she heard her baby crying in pain and suddenly realized she was too late. No. No. No. She _could not lose them both_.

Azula cares about exactly three people and no one else. Herself, Mizuki and Ty Lee, in that order. Everyone else might as well be made of stone. She cannot lose _both_. Not _both_.

Mizuki sobs hysterically as Azula picks her up and carries her inside as swiftly as she can move. She does not know _anything_ about healing—she was taught only how to inflict injury—and so she runs.

"Mama," shrieks Mizuki and Azula's heart stops. She cannot call for her other mother, can she? Can it hurt as much as it does right now?

"Azula?"

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee opens the engraved wooden box. It looks vaguely foreign due to its intricate and unusual design, but it was made in the Fire Nation. And the creature lurking inside of it also hails from the land of flames.

It is a scorpion-serpent with beautiful red scales, sharp, venomous fangs and a poised stinger on the tip of its long, muscular tail.

She saw him for sale at the open marketplace near the pier in Caldera, while she was attempting to cheer herself up with new jewelry. Never did Ty Lee like creepy crawlies but she could not resist the impulse.

Ty Lee watches it as she sets it on the bed and freezes in place. She does not know if she wants to die but she knows she would be fine with it if it happened and that is probably why she would want to adopt such a frightening and dangerous pet.

She pokes it once and then she hears her daughter shriek from the hall, "Mama!"

Ty Lee jumps up and knocks the scorpion-serpent back into its box. She slides the lid shut and hugs her daughter.

"What's wrong, sweetie?" Ty Lee asks, breathing in the scent of her daughter's hair.

"I just wanted you," she says, squeezing tighter.

Ty Lee hates herself for wishing she were uninterrupted.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Mizuki lies resting in bed. Her medicine makes her sleepy and Azula digs her nails into her legs as she tries not to think about how similar this is to Ty Lee. Not entirely. Mizuki is not comatose, Mizuki is not dying; Ursa saved her, and it is one and only one thing Azula cannot fault her for. Mizuki will wake up in the morning or even in the night and probably feel much better.

But Azula sees her there and feels that helplessness overcome her again.

She takes twice as much of the sleeping medicine because she knows she needs twice as much help with her daughter in this state. It works its magic quickly and she wakes in a field of posies. She sees Ty Lee sitting, stretching to an unnatural limit, and she sits up.

"You took so long. I was so worried," Ty Lee says, smiling at Azula. Her eyes have always been so feverishly admiring, even through the years. "Is everything okay?"

"Mizuki is sick." Azula does not say more than that. Ty Lee does not need it.

"Oh. I hope she feels better," Ty Lee says, standing. Azula does the same. "I found a place while I was waiting for you to come. Will you please look at it with me?"

"Yes," Azula agrees, walking alongside Ty Lee.

They head through the forests that are purple and red today, until they at last come to a plateau overlooking a huge, glistening dark blue lake. Azula shrugs.

"Am I supposed to be impressed by the view?" she asks.

Ty Lee just smiles. "I want to build our house here, if that's okay with you, princess. I imagine a traditional Fire Nation frontier home by a sparkly lake, which is really all I ever dreamed of."

Azula shakes her head and grimly corrects, "You dreamed about palaces."

Ty Lee smiles and says, "My beautiful princess, I have more than one dream."

"Dream," Azula bitterly says. "This is a dream. It always will be a dream."

"In the day, we've lost each other forever, but at night… at night we can live together and grow old together…"

Azula does not say anything.

Ty Lee worries about why.


	23. Worried

**Night Eighteen: W** orried

* * *

Ty Lee lies awake—albeit during a dream—in her unfinished home.

She rests her head on Azula's shoulder as they look up at the strange sky. This place never stays the same for long and they never quite found out why. The heavens above were paper white until the clouds cleared, revealing a silvery waxing gibbous moon and colorful twisting galaxies like smoky rivers. They streaked across pitch black. Neither woman closes her eyes for a moment for fear of missing anything. Someone will wake them eventually.

"How was your day?" Ty Lee asked, letting her eyes close for the first time tonight. It was to breathe in the scent of ash and freesias.

"Mizuki is better from the bite. I watched her all day; she did not leave my sight."

"It's sweet that you worry about her," Ty Lee remarks.

"I have to. Who else will? Mai and Zuko?"

"They do for me, I guess. Today… most all days they take care of her for me now. When people aren't going on about how worried they are about me, at least."

"Why are they worried?"

"They think I'm self-destructive."

"Well, then they are right to worry about you."

Ty Lee blinks several times fast. "Really? Why?"

"Because I'm selfish and if you destroy yourself I will not have you ever night withm e."

Ty Lee blushes. "That does sound like you."

Azula turns over to face Ty Lee and Ty Lee follows suit. They gaze at each other for a long while, breathless and captivated.

"Do you think this will last forever?" Ty Lee asks. "I thought you'd last forever and you didn't and so what if this place ends?"

"Then we ought to make the best of it while we still can."

Ty Lee smiles softly to herself. She stops watching the galaxies in the skies and starts watching the galaxies in her wife's eyes.

She wishes she could freeze this moment and live in it forever.


	24. Xanadu

**Night Nineteen: X** anadu

* * *

They finish their house by the next night.

It is beautiful. The brilliant, colorful night sky above serves as a draped background that accentuates the beauty of the home they built by so easily manipulating this world. It is their dream; they have the power to create whatever they please.

"We dreamed this place and I love it," Ty Lee says, wrapping her arms around Azula.

"There is more," Azula states, breaking free of her wife. She reaches her hands up and twists the stars. She bends the stars themselves to make this land of milky and honey complete. They now shine around the grand home, turning it into the Xanadu it deserves to be.

"You are the most romantic person ever," says Ty Lee, something she thought she never would with Azula. Their relationship always was nightmarish, but here, it is a sweet dream.

Ty Lee smiles. Azula kisses her.

"We conquered this dreamworld; it is only fitting I bend the stars to see your cute little sickening smile," Azula says. "It feels almost as good as seizing Ba Sing Se."

"It feels better to me, 'cause we did it together," Ty Lee states, smiling sweetly.

This world tested them, pushing them to their limits. And they _won_. They won and now they have their happily ever after.

"Forever?" Ty Lee asks, not needing to say more than that one word.

"Forever," Azula assuredly replies, her eyes flickering up and down her wife.

They will spend eternity in their Xanadu, their paradise.

They kiss again beneath the shining stars they own, in the world they alone share.

* * *

 _ **AN:**_ _I know the past few chapters have just been fluff drabbles but now that the story is coming to a close, I have another adventure chapter that will answer any remaining questions. Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoy._


	25. Yes

**Night Twenty: Y** es

* * *

In the evening, in the Fire Nation royal palace, Azula unties her hair and begins to hum as she stars smoothly combing it. Suddenly, Mai walks in, interrupting her.

"You've entered a weird stage of grief," dryly comments the Fire Lady. "I didn't know anything like it existed."

Azula tosses her hair over her shoulder and laughs derisively at her brother's bride.

"You couldn't understand if you tried."

"No, no I couldn't. She was my best friend, and I can't be happy about it."

"You're never happy," snaps Azula.

"I doubt the other mourners want to see you like this."

"Like what?"

"Blissful."

"I can feel how I damn well please. Now leave me be."

Mai does not obey. Azula's lips twist into a wicked snarl, but the Fire Lady still does not back down. Mai never feared her and Azula will forever hate her for it.

"I won't tell you how to feel."

"Good."

"I just want to make sure—"

"I have not lost my mind again?"

"I just want to make sure that you're not so happy because you're going to kill yourself."

"Oh," muses Azula, "I always did like your bluntness. It is refreshing in a world where everyone fears being straightforward with me."

"I know I never seemed like it until Ty Lee went into that coma, and I hate admitting it, but I do care about you, Azula. All of us do."

"You pity me and care for me like you would a wounded animal," says Azula sharply and Mai sighs. She does not know why she tries with this bitch. "But that cannot distub me. Now, I am going to tuck in my daughter and I would prefer to be left alone."

"Fine," says Mai apathetically.

Azula rises and goes to Mizuki. She begins to tuck the little princess in and Mizuki suddenly grabs her mother's hand.

"Will you stay with me tonight? I keep having nightmares."

It makes Azula's heart ache because for the first time in her life she has been gifted with the sweetest of dreams.

"I will stay with you tonight," agrees Azula.

And, to her daughter's joy, she makes good on her promise.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

Ty Lee spends ages undoing her braid.

She hums to herself. Zuko interrupts her, knocking on the door to make sure she is not in the middle of changing.

"Hi, Zuko," Ty Lee says, flashing a smile his way.

"I'm glad you're feeling more like yourself," the Fire Lord stiffly says. "Hearing you hum again is good. But… you miss her… I'm sure you miss her. _I_ miss her."

"Of course I do," Ty Lee says. "But I have her in my head and my heart and she will be there forever. You know?"

Zuko does not, but he nods and bows out. Ty Lee continues combing her hair, wincing between song notes as she hits every kink along the way. The next person to interrupt her is Mizuki.

"Mama, can I stay with you tonight?" Mizuki pleads, edging nervously into the room.

Ty Lee stands up and lifts Mizuki into her arms. She hugs her tightly.

"Of course you can." She releases Mizuki from the embrace and sets her down.

"Thank you, mama," Mizuki says, beaming.

They curl up together and Ty Lee falls asleep while thinking about the beauty of the dreamworld she will soon enter.

 **睡美人的** **镜** **子**

The women anticipate their home, their beautiful paradise, but instead, they stand in the deep nightmare they entered not long ago. They walk through the mist and find each other, staring with wide eyes. They thought they won.

This haunted version of Caldera, smoky and twisted and sick, lays before them. Ty Lee rises onto her tiptoes and sees the palace they both fought their way to. The only good thing about this horrid world is that it is where Azula and Ty Lee learned to love each other again.

They walk to that familiar sign: _Welcome to Hypnagogia._

Blue fire lights Azula's palm as they hear those unearthly howls of the frightening creatures that pursued them last time they were here.

They begin to run as fast as they can. They run through the strange shifting temperatures and Azula drags Ty Lee across the rushing water. They crawl when they must across the ground, the monsters at their heels every step of the way.

When they reach the palace, they stagger to a stop. A huge wall of fire blocks them off. Ty Lee shies away from it. Her mind flashes with the memory of how she received scars from a careless woman who lost control too many times.

Azula holds up a palm and stops the fire. Ty Lee shakes her head and keeps stepping backwards.

"We'll wake up. We'll wake up and we don't have to go through the fire," Ty Lees stammers.

Azula turns around and locks eyes with her. "I can get us both through."

"It—it might be a bad idea. What if something makes you lose control." Ty Lee freezes in place but she wants to run.

"Do you trust me?" Azula asks, holding out her hand.

"Yes!" Ty Lee shouts, and she grabs on.

They burst through the wall of flame, Ty Lee screaming, and cross a dried up, dilapidated courtyard to enter the palace at last.

Azula and Ty Lee run together to the throne room. A shadowy figure that makes no sense stands strong in front of them.

"Who are you? Get away!" Azula orders, lighting her hands.

The creature shakes its head. "I own this world. I am the spirit who watches over it. I _allowed_ you to build your home, and now you had to prove you deserved it."

"If this is your realm, tell us what it is. Tell us if it's real."

"It is the wall between two mirrors. It is the boundary between parallel universes. Some couples find this place when broken apart, and they must fight to stay here. The wraiths that chased you are those who I deem unworthy," says the creature and Ty Lee grabs onto Azula's hand, frightened. They cannot become those monsters. "But I deem you two worthy. You may have your happily ever after, if it pleases you. All you have to do is not use my gift as a crutch, and still live in your own universes. I do not exist to serve as decadence. Do you consent to these terms?"

"Yes," the women say almost in unison.

And the beast fades into the air, and the world of hypnogogia fades around them, replaced with the home they built.

Both women exhale a sigh of relief.

"Are you okay?" Ty Lee asks her love.

"Yes," Azula replies.

And they walk to their paradise.


	26. Zenith

**Night Twenty-One: Z** enith

* * *

Three years pass. Things get better in the separate universes. Things get easier. Azula begins to know her daughter and care for her, and Ty Lee gradually becomes less distant.

In their dreams, their worlds unite. They have each other again when they close their eyes.

Tonight, they sit together in their house beneath the twisted stars. They sip tea made of the strange purple flowers and boiled water from the crystalline lake.

Ty Lee gazes at Azula longingly.

They lived in a nightmare when they both were alive. They were in a torturous relationship that everyone saw was sick. Everyone but them.

"Why are you staring at me like that?" Azula demands, setting down her tea.

"Losing you made me realize how much I need you," Ty Lee replies.

"And losing you somehow made us reach our relationship zenith." Azula shrugs.

"Our what?" Ty Lee asks, puzzled.

"The peak, the highest we have ever been. Zenith."

"Maybe our love was as toxic as everyone said." Ty Lee sighs as she admits that defeat.

"Oh, it certainly was, but tragedies all happen for a reason."

"I thought you didn't believe in fate."

"Opinions can change."

"Yeah," says Ty Lee.

She sips her tea and gazes into Azula's golden eyes and decides, yes, yes; this is their zenith.

 **-FIN-**


End file.
